What was J.R.R. Tolkien’s academic field when he studied at Oxford?

J.R.R. Tolkien studied English language and literature at Oxford. He initially entered Exeter College to study Classics, but changed direction and completed his degree in the English school.

His academic interests centered on historical languages and medieval texts, especially Old English, Middle English, and the languages of northern Europe. This training gave him the tools to examine how words change and how literary traditions preserve older stories.

Tolkien’s career is sometimes described simply as mythology or creative writing, but those were not his formal Oxford fields. He became a philologist and professor of English language and literature. His scholarly knowledge informed the languages, names, poems, and layered histories that appear throughout his fiction.