, in a lithograph by Eugène Delacroix.]] Mephistopheles (also Mephistophilus, Mephistophilis, Mephostopheles, Mephisto and variants) is a name given to a devil or demon in the Faust legend. In the Faust legend The name is associated with the Faust legend of a scholar who wagered his soul against the devil being able to make Faust wish to live, even for a moment, based on the historical Johann Georg Faust.The name appears in the late 16th century Faust chapbooks. In the 1725 version which was read by Goethe, Mephostophiles is a devil in the form of a greyfriar summoned by Faust in a wood outside Wittenberg. The name Mephistophiles already appears in the 1527 Praxis Magia Faustiana, printed in Passau, alongside pseudo-Hebrew text. It is best explained as a purposedly obscure pseudo-Greek or pseudo-Hebrew formation of Renaissance magic. From the chapbook, the name enters Fausti

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