The demon in medieval lore often depicted as a goat-headed figure associated with the Knights Templar is Baphomet.
The name Baphomet appears in records from the 1307 trials of the Knights Templar, when members of the order were accused of heresy and idol worship. The confessions, many obtained under torture, described the alleged object inconsistently—as a head, a cat, or a three-faced figure. No reliable evidence shows that the Templars actually worshipped a goat-headed demon.
The familiar image comes much later. French occultist Éliphas Lévi illustrated a winged, androgynous goat-headed figure in Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, published in 1856. Lévi’s Baphomet symbolized balance and the reconciliation of opposites, rather than simply representing a medieval devil.
A common mix-up is treating the modern Sabbatic Goat image as an authentic Templar relic. Historians generally distinguish the medieval accusation from the nineteenth-century occult symbol, while the name itself is often linked to a medieval corruption of “Mahomet,” or Muhammad.