3 June 1914 Tolkien chairs a meeting of the Exeter College Essay Club in Mr Huntington’s rooms. He is elected Critic for Michaelmas Term. A visiting speaker, Cyril Bailey, reads a paper, Signs of the Times. (This is the last meeting recorded in the Society minutes book until Michaelmas Term 1918, but that there were meetings during 1914–18 is evident from references in the Stapeldon Magazine and elsewhere.)
6 June 1914 The Junior Common Room entertains the Senior Common Room (i.e. the Rector and Fellows of the College) with a ten-course dinner in the Hall to celebrate the sexcentenary of the foundation of Exeter College. R.H. Gordon proposes the toast to the Rector and Fellows. Tolkien proposes the toast to the College Societies, with the reply by Colin Cullis. Tolkien collects twenty-three signatures on his menu card. See note.
15 June 1914 Tolkien attends a meeting of the Stapeldon Society. The members pass a vote of congratulation for the committee that arranged the Sexcentenary Dinner.
18 June 1914 Tolkien attends the ‘Chequers Clubbe Binge’, a five-course dinner. Its printed menu has a cover designed by Tolkien and lists twelve members of the Club including himself. He and seven others sign his copy of the menu.
20 June 1914 Trinity Full Term ends.
23 June 1914 A Sexcentenary Ball is held at Exeter College. See note.
June–July 1914 Tolkien spends the early part of his vacation visiting Edith in Warwick. Probably on this visit he draws a view of Warwick Castle seen from under a bridge, apparently made from a punt or boat on the river. He will later date it ‘1913–14?’
August 1914 Tolkien explores the Lizard Peninsula in *Cornwall on foot with Father Vincent Reade of the Birmingham Oratory. Their visit extends from at least 5 August to 18 or 19 August, a period fixed by letters written by Tolkien to Edith on 5, 8, 11, 14, and 16 August (in the latter ‘only three days till I see you’; quoted by Christopher Tolkien in private correspondence). During the visit Tolkien makes several drawings: Cadgwith, Cornwall, Cove near the Lizard (Artist and Illustrator, fig. 21), and Caerthilian Cove & Lion Rock (Artist and Illustrator, fig. 20, a mistitled view of the sea off Pentreath Beach), as well as a rough sketch for the Lion Rock. On 8 August Tolkien will write to Edith:
We walked over the moor-land on top of the cliffs to Kynance Cove. Nothing I could say in a dull old letter would describe it to you. The sun beats down on you and a huge Atlantic swell smashes and spouts over the snags and reefs. The sea has carved weird wind-holes and spouts into the cliffs which blow with trumpety noises or spout foam like a whale, and everywhere you see black and red rock and white foam against violet and transparent seagreen. [quoted in Biography, p. 70]
After exploring some of the villages inland from the Lizard promontory, they walk
through rustic ‘Warwickshire’ scenery, dropped down to the banks of the Helford river (almost like a fjord), and then climbed through ‘Devonshire’ lanes up to the opposite bank, and then got into more open country, where it twisted and wiggled and wobbled and upped and downed until dusk was already coming on and the red sun just dropping. Then after adventures and redirections we came out on the bare bleak ‘Goonhilly’ downs and had a four mile straight piece with turf for our sore feet. Then we got benighted in the neighbourhood of Ruan Minor, and got into the dips and waggles again. The light got very ‘eerie’. Sometimes we plunged into a belt of trees, and owls and bats made you creep: sometimes a horse with asthma behind a hedge or an old pig with insomnia made your heart jump: or perhaps it was nothing worse than walking into an unexpected stream. The fourteen miles eventually drew to an end – and the last two miles were enlivened by the sweeping flash of the Lizard Lights and the sounds of the sea drawing nearer. [quoted in Biography, p. 71]
4 August 1914 Germany invades Belgium. Britain, one of the nations that had guaranteed the neutrality of Belgium by treaty in 1839, gives Germany an ultimatum that if its forces have not been withdrawn by midnight, Germany and Britain will be at war. – George Allen & Unwin Ltd. (*Publishers) is formed out of the assets of George Allen & Co. Ltd.
7 August 1914 Units of the British Expeditionary Force cross to France.
12 August 1914 Britain declares war on Austria-Hungary.
At least 23–30 August 1914 Tolkien stays at The White House, Northgate, Warwick. While there he writes to his Aunt May Incledon on 23 August, and to a Mrs Stafford in Oxford on 30 August, the latter to say that he would be coming up for October term at least. Possibly Tolkien stays in Warwick beyond 30 August, to be near Edith.
Late September 1914 Tolkien visits his Aunt Jane Neave and his brother Hilary at Phoenix Farm, Gedling. By this time, Hilary has enlisted in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. Tolkien having decided to finish his studies at Oxford before himself enlisting, he faces considerable family disapproval. See note. It is probably during this visit that he makes an undated drawing of Phoenix Farm in the same sketchbook that he used in Cornwall.
24 September 1914 While at Phoenix Farm, Tolkien writes the poem The Voyage of Éarendel the Evening Star (*Éalá Éarendel Engla Beorhtast), inspired by the word or name Earendel in the Old English Crist. The mariner Éarendel (later Eärendel, Eärendil) will become a key figure in the mythology or legendarium (*‘The Silmarillion’) whose invention and revision will occupy Tolkien for the rest of his life. When, however, at some time in the autumn or early winter 1914, Tolkien shows his poem to G.B. Smith, he will admit that he does not yet know what it is really about, and will promise to ‘try to find out’ (quoted in Biography, p. 75). This may take him some time, as shown by an early attempt to recast the poem in a classical setting with ‘Phosphorus’ replacing ‘Éarendel’ as the protagonist. The poem is the germ from which the mythology evolved, rather than the first consciously written poem of the mythology.
11 October 1914 Michaelmas Full Term begins.
Michaelmas Term 1914 When Tolkien returns to Oxford, he finds that many of his friends have chosen to enlist. The Examination Schools having been commandeered, lectures are given elsewhere. Tolkien attends A.S. Napier’s lectures on Pearl on Tuesdays at 12.00 noon in the Ashmolean Museum, beginning 20 October, and on Beowulf on Thursdays and Saturdays at 12.00 noon in the Ashmolean, beginning 15 October; lectures by *Sir Walter Raleigh, the Professor of English Literature, on Chaucer and His Contemporaries on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11.00 a.m. at Magdalen College, beginning 13 October; and W.A. Craigie’s lectures on the Völsunga Saga on Thursdays in the Taylor Institution, beginning 15 October – at 5.00 p.m., according to the Oxford University Gazette, but Tolkien records it in a manuscript schedule for Michaelmas Term as from 2.00 to 4.00 p.m. This schedule suggests that Tolkien is no longer attending Kenneth Sisam’s classes (during the war, held at 40 Broad Street) or repeating those he had already attended; but he has weekly tutorials with Sisam, on Mondays for an hour at midday, at each of which he is to read an essay. If he has not done so already in Trinity Term 1914, he possibly attends lectures by Sir John Rhys on Welsh: The Mabinogion (White Book Text) on Tuesdays and Fridays at 5.00 p.m. at Jesus College, beginning 16 October. – Tolkien and Colin Cullis, the latter prevented from enlisting by poor health, decide to live in ‘digs’ rather than in college, and find rooms at 59 St John Street (see note).
Mid-October 1914–June 1915 Although there will be no conscription until late in the war there is considerable pressure on all young men to join up, and great disapproval of those who do not. Tolkien is therefore pleased to discover the existence of a scheme by which he can prepare for the Army with the Officers Training Corps at Oxford while continuing to study, and need not go on active service until he has taken his degree. In this context, Tolkien drills in the University Parks from 9.00 to 10.00 a.m. on Mondays, 9.00–10.00 a.m. and 2.00–4.30