Well in the history of communism, both were synonyms until Marx and Lenin popularized the "dictatorship of the proletariat". The 1871 Paris Commune (150y annive

Well in the history of communism, both were synonyms until Marx and Lenin popularized the "dictatorship of the proletariat". The 1871 Paris Commune (150y anniversary this year!) although it had some minor authoritarian components was profoundly anti-authoritarian and its massacre gave birth to the modern anarchist movement and the famous black flag (as worn by Louise Michel to commemorate the dozens of thousands of civilians and Communards executed by French army). The common understanding of communism used to be (and still is in many cultures/circles) the redistribution/decentralization of power and resources. The February "revolution" in 1917 in Russia was famously very decentralized with "soviets" (base assemblies) popping up everywhere (as trade unions, as local councils, etc) and organizing from the bottom up without a central authority. That is, until the october revolution during which Lenin and Trotsky and their power-hungry friends started literally hunting down all the anarcho-communists with their secret police in order to build their State-capitalist dystopia. If you're curious about more details about anarcho-communism and its varied history, I would recommend Emma Goldman's autobiography (which goes into great lengths about propaganda vs reality in bolshevik Russia) or Martha Ackelsberg's account of the Spanish revolution (1936) "Free women of spain". There's of course a lot more to be read on that topic if you're curious, but i found these two books to be very broad introductions to anarchism although they don't cover all the topics that intersect with anarchist politics (eg. anti-colonialism).