Gustave Bloch

Who was Gustave Bloch?

Gustave Bloch was a French Jewish historian of ancient history born in Fegersheim, a commune located in the department of Bas-Rhin. He was the father of historian Marc Bloch, who along with Lucien Febvre, was co-founder of the École des Annales.

He received his agrégation in 1872, and during the following year began teaching classes in rhetoric at Lycée de Besançon. In 1876 he became a lecturer, and several years later started work as a professor of Greek and Roman antiquities at the University of Lyon. Beginning in 1888 he taught history at the École Normale Supérieure, where he succeeded historian Paul Guiraud [1850-1907. From 1904 to 1919 he was a professor of Roman history at the Faculté des lettres in Paris.