20th-century French historians

Georges Goyau (31 May 1869 – 25 October 1939) was a French historian and essayist specializing in religious history.

Jules Isaac (18 November 1877 in Rennes – 6 September 1963 in Aix-en-Provence) was "a well known and highly respected Jewish historian in France with an impressive career in the world of education" by the time World War II began.Internationally, Isaac was most well known for his tireless work after the War in the field of Jewish-Christian relations, starting with his book Jésus et Israël, which was written during the war and made him a protagonist in the Seelisberg Conference of 1947, culminating in his decisive key role in the origin of the groundbreaking declaration Nostra Aetate during the Second Vatican Council. In the 1950s, Isaac had an international reputation for his work in Christian and Jewish relations.

André Siegfried (April 21, 1875 – March 28, 1959) was a French academic, geographer and political writer best known to English speakers for his commentaries on American, Canadian, and British politics.
He was born in Le Havre, France, to Jules Siegfried, the French minister of commerce, and Julie Siegfried, the president of the National Council of French Women. An active member of the Democratic Republican Alliance like his father, André Siegfried was several times a candidate for the Chamber of Deputies, but never won an election. On 23 January 1941, he was made a member of the National Council of Vichy France. A few months after the liberation of France in mid-1944, he was elected to the Académie française, taking the vacant seat of Gabriel Hanotaux (who had been elected in 1897). He died in Paris in March 1959.

Bruno Paulin Gaston Paris (French pronunciation: [ɡastɔ̃ paʁis]; 9 August 1839 – 5 March 1903) was a French literary historian, philologist, and scholar specialized in Romance studies and medieval French literature. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1901, 1902, and 1903.

Ernest Lavisse (French: [lavis]; 17 December 1842 – 18 August 1922) was a French historian. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature five times. Lavisse is also known for being one of the main creator of the roman national ("National myth", lit. "national novel"), thank to his history schoolbooks.

Jean Lacouture (9 June 1921 – 16 July 2015) was a journalist, historian and author. He was particularly famous for his biographies.

Georges Blond (Jean-Marie Hoedick, 11 July 1906 in Marseille – 16 March 1989 in Paris), was a French writer. A prolific writer of mostly history but also other topics including fiction, Blond was also involved in far right political activity.

Élisabeth Badinter (née Bleustein-Blanchet; born 5 March 1944) is a French philosopher, author and historian.
She is best known for her philosophical treatises on feminism and women's role in society. She is an advocate of liberal feminism and women migrant workers' rights in France. Badinter is described as having a commitment to Enlightenment rationalism and universalism. She advocates for a "moderate feminism". A 2010 Marianne news magazine poll named her France's "most influential intellectual", primarily on the basis of her books on women's rights and motherhood.Badinter is the largest shareholder of Publicis Groupe, a multinational advertising and public relations company, and the chairwoman of its supervisory board. She received these shares in an inheritance from her father, Marcel Bleustein-Blanchet, who founded the company. According to Forbes, she is one of the wealthiest French citizens with a fortune of around US$ 1.8 billion in 2012.

Alain Decaux (23 July 1925 − 27 March 2016) was a French historian. He was elected to the Académie française on 15 February 1979.
In 2005, he was, with others authors as Frédéric Beigbeder, Mohamed Kacimi, Richard Millet and Jean-Pierre Thiollet, among the Beirut Book Fair's main guests in the Beirut International Exhibition & Leisure Center, commonly (BIEL).

René Huyghe (3 May 1906 – 5 February 1997) was a French writer on the history, psychology and philosophy of art. He was also a curator at the Louvre's department of paintings (from 1930), a professor at the Collège de France and from 1960 a member of the Académie Française. He was the father of the writer François-Bernard Huyghe.