Editing Marc Bloch (section)

=== Upbringing and education ===
Bloch's biographer Katherine Stirling ascribed significance to the era in which Bloch was born: the middle of the [[French Third Republic]], so "after those who had founded it and before the generation that would aggressively challenge it".{{Sfn|Stirling|2007|p=527}}{{Refn|The latter generation included nationalist [[Boulangists]] and crises such as the [[Panama scandals]] in the last decade of the nineteenth century.{{sfn|Friedman|1996|p=6}}|group=note}} When Bloch was nine-years-old, the [[Dreyfus affair]] broke out in France. As the first major display of political [[antisemitism]] in Europe, it was probably a formative event of Bloch's youth,{{Sfn|Fink|1989|p=19}}{{Refn|In ''The Historian's Craft'', Bloch describes himself as one of "the last of the generation of the Dreyfus Affair".{{sfn|Bloch|1963|p=154}}|group=note}} along with, more generally, the atmosphere of ''[[fin de siècle]]'' Paris.{{Sfn|Stirling|2007|p=527}} Bloch was 11 when [[Émile Zola]] published ''[[J'Accuse…!]]'', his indictment of the French establishment's antisemitism and corruption.{{Sfn|Hughes-Warrington|2015|p=10}} Bloch was greatly affected by the Dreyfus affair, but even more affected was nineteenth-century France generally, and his father's employer, the École Normale Supérieure, saw existing divides in French society reinforced in every debate.{{Sfn|Friedman|1996|p=6}} Gustave Bloch was closely involved in the [[Dreyfusard]] movement and his son agreed with the cause.{{Sfn|Friedman|1996|p=6}}

Bloch was educated at the prestigious [[Lycée Louis-le-Grand]] for three years, where he was consistently head of his class and won prizes in French, history, Latin, and natural history.{{Sfn|Friedman|1996|p=7}} He passed his ''[[baccalauréat]]'', in Letters and Philosophy, in July 1903, being graded ''trés bien'' (very good).{{Sfn|Fink|1989|p=24}} The following year,{{Sfn|Stirling|2007|p=527}} he received a scholarship{{Sfn|Fink|1989|p=24}} and undertook postgraduate study there for the École normale supérieure (ÉNS){{Sfn|Stirling|2007|p=527}} (where his father had been appointed ''[[maître de conferences]]'' in 1887).{{Sfn|Friedman|1996|p=4}} His father had been nicknamed ''le Méga'' by his students at the ÉNS and the moniker ''Microméga'' was bestowed upon Bloch.{{Sfn|Schöttler|2010|p=415}}{{Refn|His father's nickname was a reference to the skeleton of a ''[[megatherium]]'' which was housed in the ÉNS.{{sfn|Friedman|1996|p=7}}|group=note}} Here he was taught history by [[Christian Pfister]]{{Sfn|Lyon|1987|p=198}} and [[Charles Seignobos]], who led a relatively new school of historical thought which saw history as broad themes punctuated by tumultuous events.{{Sfn|Stirling|2007|p=527}} Another important influence on Bloch from this period was his father's contemporary, the sociologist [[Émile Durkheim]], who pre-figured Bloch's own later emphasis on cross-disciplinary research.{{Sfn|Stirling|2007|p=527}} The same year, Bloch visited England; he later recalled being struck more by the number of homeless people on the [[Victoria Embankment]] than the new Entente Cordiale relationship between the two countries.{{Sfn|Fink|1989|pp=24–25}}

The Dreyfus affair had soured Bloch's views of the [[French Army]], and he considered it laden with "snobbery, anti-semitism and anti-republicanism".{{Sfn|Fink|1989|p=22}} [[National service]] had been made compulsory for all French adult males in 1905, with an enlistment term of two years.{{Sfn|Gat|1992|p=93}} Bloch joined the [[4th Infantry Regiment (France)|46th Infantry Regiment]] based at [[Pithiviers]] from 1905 to 1906.{{Sfn|Fink|1989|p=22}}