Jacques Roux

French radical Roman Catholic priest that took an active role in the revolutionary politics during the French Revolution. Nicknamed 'le Curé Rouge', he is considered a precursor of modern socialism and anarchism. A skillful orator who communicated the ideals of popular democracy and classless society to crowds of the poorest Parisian sans-culottes, working class wage earners and shopkeepers, radicalising them into a dangerous revolutionary force as well as inciting women to assert their rights. He became a leader of a popular far-left political faction known as the Enragés, writing the famed 'Manifeste des Enragés', which was signed by Jean Varlet and Leclerc d'Oze, and in 1791 was elected to the Paris Commune.