A REVOLUTIONARY document that lay undiscovered in a Newcastle library for over 200 years has just been published.

Thomas Spence’s penny pamphlet Property and Land is Every One’s Right is one of the founding texts of the English radical tradition, pre-dating Marxism.

Believed lost for many years, the original has not been in print since November 8, 1775.

This year marks the 200th anniversary of the author's death.

Professor Alistair Bonnett, from Newcastle University, said: “Today his name is little known but this in no way reflects his significance. 'Spenceanism', which called for the democratic, common ownership of the land, was once hugely influential among the poor,” he added. “It also appears to be the only political ideology to have ever been outlawed by the British Parliament.”

Thomas Spence: The Poor Man’s Revolutionary is edited by Prof Bonnett and poet Keith Armstrong.

To reach a mass audience, he invented his own phonetic alphabet and issued thousands of coins embossed with political messages.

“Perhaps Spence can be best summed up by one of the inscriptions he placed on one of his self-minted coins, the coin his friends chose to place in his coffin,” said Prof Bonnett. “It depicts a cat, staring straight out at us, and around it are the words, "In society live free like me."

Born into poverty Newcastle in 1750, Spence is believed to be the first person to write about 'the rights of man' in English.

In 1787 he moved to London, setting up a bookshop, and became immersed in the capital’s radical sub-culture

Prof Bonnett will be discussing Thomas Spence: The Poor Man’s Revolutionary, with Dr Keith Armstrong at 7pm on November 18 2014 at the Lit & Phil, Westgate Road, Newcastle.