  We present the results of fitting deep off-nuclear optical spectroscopy of
radio-quiet quasars, radio-loud quasars and radio galaxies at z ~ 0.2 with
evolutionary synthesis models of galaxy evolution. Our aim was to determine the
age of the dynamically dominant stellar populations in the hos t galaxies of
these three classes of powerful AGN. Some of our spectra display residual
nuclear contamination at the shortest wavelengths, but the detailed quality of
the fits longward of the 4000A break provide unequivocal proof, if further
proof were needed, that quasars lie in massive galaxies with (at least at z ~
0.2) evolved stellar populations. By fitting a two-component model we have
separated the very blue (starburst and/or AGN contamination) from the redder
underlying spectral energy distribution, and find that the hosts of all three
classes of AGN are dominated by old stars of age 8 - 14 Gyr. If the blue
component is attributed to young stars, we find that, at most, 1% of the
baryonic mass of these galaxies is involved in star-formation activity at the
epoch of observation. These results strongly support the conclusion reached by
McLure et al. (1999) that the host galaxies of luminous quasars are massive
ellipticals which formed prior to the peak epoch of quasar activity at z ~ 2.5.
