Termagant

[1][2] It originates in the eleventh-century Song of Roland The word is also used in modern English to mean a violent, overbearing, turbulent, brawling, quarrelsome woman; a virago, shrew, or vixen.

European literature from the Middle Ages often refers to Muslims as pagans and depicts them worshipping Muhammad along with various idols and sometimes other deities, such as Apollyon, Lucifer and Termagant.

There are many hypotheses explaining the origin of the name, but it does not seem to derive from any actual aspect of Muslim belief or practice, however wildly distorted.

He defends that first proposed by Ugo Foscolo in 1819 that Tervagan is the dea trivia, the threefold moon goddess Luna–Diana–Persephone (or Selene–Artemis–Hecate), attested since classical antiquity.

Joseph T. Shipley argues that the Italian Trivigante became confused with termigisto, meaning "boaster," derived from Hermes Trismegistus, leading to Termagant.

[5] Leo Spitzer argues that Tervagant, like several other names ending in -ant from the Matter of France (e.g. Baligant and Morgant), is an "occitanization" of a vulgar Latin present participle created by Old French poets for exotic effect.

[7] James A. Bellamy proposes that the names Tervagan and Apollin in the Song of Roland derive from Ibn ʿAffān and Abū Bakr, two of Muhammad's companions, in-laws and successors.

In the Chanson de Roland, the Saracens, having lost the battle of Roncesvalles, desecrate their "pagan idols" (lines 2589–90) including Tervagan.

Tervagant is also a statue worshipped by the "king of Africa" in the Jean Bodel play in Old French after the end of the Third Crusade (c.1200), Le jeu de saint Nicolas.