He passed his baccalaureat in 1871 at Tournon, where he studied with the French Symbolist poet and critic Stéphane Mallarmé.

[1] After a stellar academic career at the École normale supérieure where he took courses with Numa Denis Fustel de Coulanges and Ernest Lavisse, he completed a degree in history.

He is regarded, along with his friend the physiologist Louis Lapicque, as one of the two founders of the scientific and humanistic community "Sorbonne-Plage" at L'Arcouest in Ploubazlanec, near Paimpol.

[citation needed] Considered along with Charles-Victor Langlois as one of the leading proponents of the historical method, Seignobos wrote a number of works on political history which implemented the German historical method,[citation needed] benefiting from his excellent knowledge of linguistic particulars in documentary research in English and German.

[citation needed] To emphasize the importance of primary sources, Seignobos and Langlois began their book "L'Introduction aux études historiques" (1898) with their famous maxim, "History is made with documents.