Which Oxford university chair did Tolkien hold before becoming Merton Professor?

Before becoming Merton Professor, Tolkien held the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professorship of Anglo-Saxon.

Tolkien was appointed Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford in 1925. He held the post until 1945, teaching and researching Old English language and literature. The chair was based at Pembroke College, where Tolkien also wrote and developed important parts of his fiction.

In 1945 he moved to Merton College and became Merton Professor of English Language and Literature. The two titles are often confused because both were senior Oxford positions and both related to Tolkien’s expertise in language and literary history.

His Anglo-Saxon scholarship influenced his creative work in many ways. He drew on Old English vocabulary, heroic poetry, manuscript traditions, and northern European legend. His famous academic lecture “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics,” delivered in 1936, helped change the critical study of Beowulf.