Given her love of materialist things, it may be surprising to learn of Victoria Beckham's Communist roots.

A leading German historian claims the Spice Girl is related to a 19th century Communist who was a close comrade of revolutionary Karl Marx.

Hans Mueller says the 34-year-old pop star is the great-great-great-granddaughter of revolutionary and artist Carl Heinrich Pfaender.

Revolutionary past: Victoria Beckham (L) is said to be a descendent of one of Karl Marx's (R) close Communist comrades Carl Heinrich Pfaender

Pfaender, who lived from 1819 to 1876, was a close friend of Marx and his Communist Manifesto co-author Friedrich Engels.

Pfaender participated in the failed revolution of 1848, and like Marx, was forced to flee Germany to London.

Mueller discovered Pfaender struggled to live in the capital by painting and working as a miniaturist.

The historian said: 'He certainly didn't get rich doing it. His wife was buried in a pauper's grave.'

After tracing Pfaender's family tree to Beckham on her mother Jacqueline Adams' side, the historian contacted the famous family.

Mueller said Addams had confirmed his research was right and she has promised to tell her daughter.

Marx, recognised as the father of Communism, died in 1883 after a long illness and was buried in Highgate Cemetary in north London.

The philosophy of Victoria Beckham (1974 -)

Some words of wisdom from the style guru herself:

 - 'If you haven't got it. Fake it! Too short? Wear big high heels, but do practice walking!'

 - 'You have to remember that when you are a performer you become a celebrity, but you are not saving lives. It's not that important.'

 - 'I'm not materialistic. I believe in presents from the heart, like a drawing that a child does.'

 - 'I think models are thin, that’s the way that it is. All of the girls - I know quite a few models and they actually eat, they’re just naturally thin girls. And just because you’re thin it doesn’t mean you have an eating disorder.'

The philosophy of Karl Marx (1818 - 1883)

Some inspirational speeches from the Father of Communism:

 - 'The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.'

 - 'The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it.'

 - 'Communism... is the genuine resolution of the antagonism between man and nature and between man and man; it is the true resolution of the conflict between existence and essence, objectification and self-affirmation, freedom and necessity, individual and species. It is the riddle of history solved and knows itself as the solution'

 - 'Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past.'