What academic title did J.R.R. Tolkien hold at Oxford University from 1925?

From 1925, J.R.R. Tolkien held the title Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University.

He occupied the chair at Pembroke College, Oxford, from 1925 until 1945. The position focused on Old English language and literature, subjects central to Tolkien’s scholarly work and teaching.

In 1945, he moved to Oxford’s Merton College and became Merton Professor of English Language and Literature. He remained in that post until his retirement in 1959.

Tolkien’s academic career was not separate from his creative writing. His expertise in Old English, Middle English, Norse literature, and historical linguistics informed names, poems, stories, and invented languages in Middle-earth. His 1936 lecture and essay “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics” became especially influential in the study of the Old English poem.