Mephistopheles (, ), also known as Mephisto,
is a
demon featured in
German folklore
German folklore is the folk tradition which has developed in Germany over a number of centuries. Partially it can be also found in Austria.
Characteristics
It shares many characteristics with Nordic folklore and English folklore due to t ...
. He originally appeared in literature as the demon in the
Faust
Faust is the protagonist of a classic German folklore, German legend based on the historical Johann Georg Faust ( 1480–1540).
The wiktionary:erudite, erudite Faust is highly successful yet dissatisfied with his life, which leads him to make a ...
legend, and he has since appeared in other works as a
stock character (see:
Mephistopheles in the arts and popular culture).
Etymology and name meaning
The name ''Mephistopheles'' is a corrupted
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
compound.
The Greek particle of negation (μη, ''mē'') and the Greek word for love or loving (φίλος, ''philos'') are the first and last terms of the compound but the middle term is more doubtful. For the middle term, three meanings have been noticed and three different complete etymologies have been established:
*not loving light (φως το, ''phōs to''; the old form of the word being ''Mephostopheles'')
*not loving Faust
*allied to ''