What was the name of Tolkien’s Oxford college when he became a fellow in 1925?

J.R.R. Tolkien became a fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford, in 1925.

Tolkien joined Pembroke College as Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon in 1925 and remained there until 1945. During this period he taught, researched Old English, and developed much of the early material that became The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

Pembroke was especially important to Tolkien’s creative life because he wrote The Hobbit while associated with the college. He also began The Lord of the Rings during his Pembroke years, although the work took many years to complete and was published only after he had moved to Merton College.

Tolkien transferred to Merton in 1945 when he became Merton Professor of English Language and Literature. This move explains a common biographical mix-up: Pembroke is strongly connected with the writing of his major fiction, while Merton was his later Oxford academic home. Both colleges are central to his career, but they belong to different stages.