Franklin Edgerton was an American linguistic scholar. He was Salisbury Professor of Sanskrit and Comparative Philology at Yale University (1926) and visiting professor at Benares Hindu University (1953–4). Between 1913 and 1926, he was the Professor of Sanskrit at the University of Pennsylvania. He is well known for his exceptionally literal translation of the Bhagavad Gita which was published as volume 38-39 of the Harvard Oriental Series in 1944. He also edited the parallel edition of four recensions of the Simhāsana Dvātrṃśika, and a reconstruction of the (lost) original Sanskrit text of the Panchatantra.