The J. R. R. Tolkien Companion and Guide: Volume 1: Chronology. Christina Scull

Icelandic, William Craigie, to join the staff of the New English Dictionary, later and more widely known as the *Oxford English Dictionary.

      11 November 1918 The Armistice is signed.

      19 November 1918 By this date Tolkien is staying at 39 St John’s Street, Oxford.

      29 November 1918 Tolkien writes notes on possible ways to work Watling Street, Wéland (Wayland), and the Romans into his private mythology.

      Late 1918 Tolkien, Edith, John, and Jennie Grove move into rooms at 50 St John Street, Oxford, let by a Miss Mahon.

      16 December 1918 Christopher Wiseman, on leave in London, replies to a letter from Tolkien which took seven weeks to reach him, having followed his ship to Sevastopol and back. He had heard just before that letter arrived that Tolkien is now in Oxford. Wiseman, still on active service in the Navy, describes his future movements.

      27 December 1918 Wiseman replies to a message from Tolkien. He is sorry to have been unable to visit Oxford. He must now return to HMS Monarch for a short time, then take up an appointment at Cambridge teaching junior officers. He assumes that Tolkien is now settled at 50 St John Street.

1919

      1919 Tolkien marks the new year by beginning to record in a diary principal events in his life and his thoughts about them. He writes in English, at first with Roman letters, but later in a phonetic alphabet of his own invention. Eventually he attaches this to his mythology and names it the ‘Alphabet of Rúmil’ after the Elvish sage in his stories who devised letters to record Qenya texts (*Writing systems). From 1919 to the mid-1920s he will make constant alterations to the alphabet, so that even he will have difficulty reading it, and will rarely use it after 1930.

      1919–1920 Tolkien revises his poem The Pool of the Dead Year (first composed in November–December 1915), now entitled The Pool of Forgetfulness. Probably during this period he also writes the poems The Brothers in Arms (later reworked as The Brothers-in-Arms), and Nursery Rhymes Undone (later revised as The Cat and the Fiddle, see *The Man in the Moon Stayed Up Too Late).

      c. 1919–c. 1923 Tolkien writes a series of tables of Qenya pronouns and pronominal prefixes and suffixes (*‘Early Qenya Pronouns’). Later he reuses some of these sheets, with other discarded papers (including a letter dated 4 June 1920), in compiling a partial English–Old English dictionary.

      ?January–?June 1919 Tolkien writes a cosmogonical myth, The Music of the Ainur (*Ainulindalë), and otherwise continues work on The Book of Lost Tales, but largely abandons it, apparently by the end of June 1919. (See further, article on *The Book of Lost Tales in Reader’s Guide.) The tales written in this period tell of the conflicts between the renegade Melko and the rest of the Valar (guardians or angelic powers) when he tried to seize the rule of the world; Melko’s destruction of the Two Trees which gave light to Valinor, home of the Valar and of many Elves; his theft of precious jewels from the Elves and his flight into Middle-earth (not yet so-called); and the long and bitter war of the Elves with Melko in the hope of recovering their jewels. Some tales are left only in the form of rough notes and outlines which suggest that the author is undecided about many things in his mythology. – Probably during this period Tolkien extensively re-writes The Fall of Gondolin in ink over the original pencil version, and Edith makes a fair copy of the revision. – A list, *Corrected Names of Chief Valar, and a brief Qenya text associated with The Nauglafring: The Necklace of the Dwarves (The Book of Lost Tales), *‘Si Qente Feanor’, may also date from this period. – At this time Tolkien also writes revisions to his Gnomish lexicon on the backs of Oxford English Dictionary proof slips.

      January 1919 Tolkien begins work as an assistant at the Oxford English Dictionary in the Old Ashmolean building in Broad Street, Oxford, a short walk from the Tolkien home in St John Street. Under the supervision of *Henry Bradley, he will work on words beginning with ‘W’. Most of those on the Dictionary staff also teach in the University, and their hours are flexible: Oxford University Press records at the end of March 1919 show that up to that date Tolkien was paid only one and one-half months’ salary. – Tolkien will also accept tutorial work, and will come to find his services increasingly sought, particularly by the Oxford women’s colleges, where English is one of the more popular subjects. He tutors students from Lady Margaret Hall, St Hugh’s, Somerville, and St Hilda’s, mainly in small groups. It is an advantage that he is married, as Edith’s presence means that the colleges do not need to send a chaperone when their young ladies are tutored by Tolkien at his home.

      19 January 1919 Hilary Full Term begins at Oxford.

      Hilary Term 1919 Tolkien is noted as an Honorary Member of the Exeter College Essay Club, but is not recorded as present at any meetings during this term.

      14 February 1919 Tolkien is examined by the Standing Medical Board, Merton Street, Oxford. The Board declares him unfit for general service or service abroad for six months, and unfit for active duty with troops on home service for three months, but fit for sedentary employment.

      17 February 1919 W.W.T. Massiah-Palmer dies after becoming ill on active service.

      21 February 1919 Tolkien reads part of William Blake’s prophetic books, which he has never seen before, and discovers to his astonishment several similarities in the nomenclature (though not necessarily the function) between Blake’s beings and those in his own mythology.

      15 March 1919 Hilary Full Term ends.

      3 April 1919 The first slips prepared by Tolkien for the Oxford English Dictionary with editorial text and illustrative quotations, after emendation and approval by Bradley, are sent to Oxford University Press for typesetting. As Tolkien becomes more proficient, Bradley makes fewer alterations. Some of Tolkien’s later work on the Dictionary will be under the editorship of *C.T. Onions.

      27 April 1919 Trinity Full Term begins.

      14 May 1919 In the evening, Tolkien attends a meeting of the Exeter College Essay Club at which C.A.R. Radford reads a paper on Rupert Brooke.

      4 June 1919 In the evening, Tolkien attends a meeting of the Exeter College Essay Club at which *Wilfred R. Childe, an honorary visitor, reads a paper on modern poetry.

      7 June 1919 Tolkien is examined by the Standing Medical Board, Merton Street, Oxford. The Board declares him unfit for general service or service abroad for six months, but fit for active duty with troops on home service. Tolkien is ordered ‘to return to O.U.T.C. [Officers’ University and Technical Classes] Oxford to complete his course’ and the Ministry of Labour is to be informed.

      21 June 1919 Trinity Full Term ends.

      28 June 1919 The Treaty of Versailles with Germany is signed. Germany cedes Alsace-Lorraine to France, the larger part of Posen and West Prussia to Poland, and other territory to Belgium. The German army is not to exceed 100,000 men in number, and the size and number of its guns are restricted. Its naval power is also limited. An area thirty miles on the east side of the Rhine is to be demilitarized.

      Summer 1919 Tolkien inscribes ‘Summer 1919’ in his copy of A Welsh Grammar for Schools by E. Anwyl (3rd edn., London, 1907).

      Summer–autumn 1919 Probably during this period Tolkien is commissioned by Oxford University Press to write the glossary (*A Middle English Vocabulary) for the collection Fourteenth Century Verse & Prose, edited by his former tutor, Kenneth Sisam. Much research will be required for this, his first academic publication; and it may be for this reason that after June 1919 he largely abandons The Book of Lost Tales. Although he (apparently) now begins to retell the tale of Túrin Turambar