Which Oxford subject did J.R.R. Tolkien teach as a professor from 1945?

From 1945, J.R.R. Tolkien taught English language and literature as a professor at the University of Oxford.

Tolkien became Merton Professor of English Language and Literature in 1945, succeeding at Oxford after earlier academic posts at Leeds and Pembroke College. His work combined philology, the historical study of language, with literary scholarship.

He held the Merton professorship until 1959. Tolkien’s academic expertise in Old English, Middle English, Norse, and related languages strongly influenced the names, histories, and linguistic structure of his fictional worlds.

He is sometimes described simply as an English professor, which is broadly understandable but less precise. His Oxford career included several positions, and he was also Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon before moving to the Merton chair. His famous 1936 lecture “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics” helped change modern scholarly views of the poem.