Athanase Auger

Athanase Auger, born 12 December 1734 in Paris, where he died on 7 February 1792, was a French educator, Hellenist and translator.

Life and Work

A priest of the diocese of Paris and master of arts, he was denied Agrégation by the University of Paris in 1766. He was professor of rhetoric at the royal college of Rouen from 1 July 1762 until 1776 and was grand vicar to the bishop of Lescar.

He took a position at Brécé on 16 February 1766, but resigned the next day to take another one at Ambrières. Alphonse-Victor Angot is unable to say if he ever actually performed any duties in this parish. In any case, he resigned from Ambrières on 20 May 1767, in favour of his colleague Jacques-Claude des Nos. He resumed his classes on rhetoric in Rouen, until 1776 when he left and established himself in Paris.

He translated the Greek orators and historians, including the complete works of Demosthenes, Aeschines, Isocrates and Lysias, as well as Andocides, Antiphon, Demades, Dinarchus, Herodotus, Isaeus, Lycurgus, Thucydides, and Xenophon. He also translated the church fathers Basil of Caesarea and John Chrysostom, as well as the Orations of Cicero and the Constitution des Romains sous les rois et au temps de la République (Constitution of the Romans under the Kings and in Republican times), a ten volume work which was published posthumously in 1792.