Medieval Christians imagined Muhammad as a monstrous race-begotter with magical sexual powers

Evidence

The dominant vision expressed in medieval Christian writings about Islam’s founder is that he was a monster who begot a monstrous race, a sexual monster with impressive powers, including a super-supply of semen-a gift that is magically transferred to all Muslim men, who, according to at least one text, had penises the size of trees. Early Christians often identified Muhammad with Biblical monsters. In one example, Alvarus identifies the Prophet with both Behemoth and Leviathan. Pope Innocent III claimed that Muhammad was the Antichrist: A certain son of perdition, Muhammad the pseudo-prophet, arose. — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 126

Categorization

• QUESTION: Worth tracing how the ‘penises the size of trees’ trope migrated and whether it persists in modern anti-Muslim caricature.
• XREF: Connects to the reader’s guiding question on the monster/demon/giant figures carrying Western anxiety, and to claims about the image preceding real contact.
• ADDENDUM: The ‘sexual monster’ genealogy parallels how moral panics weaponize bodily/moral fears; echoes the dress-panic article’s class-signaling angle.