Why do Renaissance Angels have Peacock Wings?
“It takes considerable painterly imagination to approach the wings of angels. That angels even HAVE wings is a matter of theological debate.” — Sally Hickson
You may have noticed, strolling around rooms filled with medieval and Renaissance Christian art, that some angels are adorned with large, luminous and multi-coloured peacock-wings. And once you see them once; you’ll see them everywhere.
The important question is: why? Here are 5 possible reasons why heavenly messengers might have been depicted with peacock wings.
1. To signify status.
The idea that angels had bird-wings can be traced to scriptural authority. There are poetic verses in Psalms that describe God’s wings as having feathers (Psalm 91:4) and there are women, possibly angels, “with the wings of a stork” (Zechariah 5:9). But only cherubim wings are described with eyes: “And their whole body, their backs, their hands, their wings, and the wheels were full of eyes all around” (Ezekiel, 10:12). This could explain the choice of eyed peacock-feathers for cherubim — at the top of the angel hierarchy — but what about angels with more human-like forms?
Perhaps they borrowed wings from the cherubim for a special occasion. Or, it could be that painters chose to a) elevate the status of certain angels with peacock-wings (e.g. Gabriel, or Raphael) or b) avoid confusion with other figures in the painting such as saints, angels of lower orders, biblical or historical characters belonging to the earthly realm at the time of the scene.
2. Because they look nice.
Peacock feathers are undeniably a step above those of an average bird. Not only a beautiful, rare and exquisite sight but symbolic of royalty. When contemplating why angels might be depicted with colourful peacock wings rather than more realistic, bird-wings, Anna Jameson decided in 1857 that they were simply “infinitely more beautiful”:
“with long, slender feathers, eyed sometimes like the peacock’s train, bedropped with gold like the pheasant’s breast, tinted with azure and violet and crimson, ‘colors dipp’d in Heaven’ — they are really angel-wings, not bird-wings.” [1]
Boccaccio, too, associates the peacock with angel wings when, analysing the presence of a peacock in a prophetic dream, he describes its angelic feathers containing a hundred eyes: “ha penna angelica, e in quella ha cento occhi.” [2] Therefore peacock wings may be an attempt to represent the celestial beauty of angels, their aura and their dazzling display to the human eye whilst demonstrating brilliant artistry.
3. Because of ancient precedents.
In Greek and Roman mythology, Argos was an all-seeing (panoptês) herdsmen with a hundred eyes. Most famously employed by Hera (or Juno) to guard her rival, Io, with celestial vigilance until Hermes lulled him to sleep and decapitated him on behalf of Zeus. As a result, Ovid tells us that Hera placed Argos’ eyes into the tail of a peacock: “Saturnia [Juno] retrieved those eyes to set in place among the feathers of her bird [the peacock] and filled his tail with starry jewels.” [3]
In a Christian context, the eyes set within angel-wings maintain this “all-seeing” notion of divine perception, now associated with the omnipotence of God. The peacock as an attribute of Juno (the old queen of Heaven) also became associated with Mary (the new queen of Heaven). That’s why you’ll often see peacock feathered angel wings — or a peacock itself — in scenes of the Annunciation, paintings of her house in Nazareth or in the garden near her chamber. [4]
4. Because of contemporary precedents.
Let’s take the example of the beautiful, almost metallic, angel wings in the famous fresco cycle by Benozzo Gozzoli, painted for Palazzo Medici around 1460. In the Adoration section, flocks of serene angels frame the natural scene with their iridescent peacock-wings in gradient colours or gilded in gold. In the background, we can see one angel approaching a peacock on the garden balustrade to “feed” it — which more alarmingly, invites speculation on how the angels acquired their wings in the first place...
Gozzoli may have formed the idea for his peacock wings from viewing medieval and contemporary depictions, such as those found in the Annunciation of Filippo Lippi (also for Palazzo Medici, between 1440–1459). Around the corner, Giovanni da Fiesole had gained fame for his frescoes at San Marco (between 1438–1445) which often feature peacock-winged angels and for which he may have later gained the nickname Fra Angelico.
5. Because the peacock is a symbol of re-birth and the eternal life.
The peacock has been seen as a symbol of immortality by various cultures because it was believed that when a peacock dies, it does not decay. This was noted by the early Church fathers such as Augustine (City of God, Book 21) and Isidore of Seville (Etymologies, 12.7.48.)
It also had connotations of re-birth: Pliny the Elder describes how peacock feathers are “born again with the spring flowers” [5] which makes a fitting analogy for the Spring resurrection of Christ. This may explain the presence of peacocks on early Christian and Byzantine tombs, as a reference to the immortality of the soul.
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Footnotes
[1] “Excipit hos volucrisque suae Saturnia pennis / collocat et gemmis caudam stellantibus inplet” Ovid. Met. I. 722.
[2] See Marjorie O’Rourke Boyle, Loyala’s Acts: The Rhetoric of the Self, 2021, p. 115.
[3] Anna Jameson, Sacred and Legendary Art, 1857, p. 50.
[4] Boccaccio, Trattatello in laude di dante in Dante e Firenze: Prose antiche con note illustrative ed appendici, ed. O. Zenatti, 1901 p. 197: Link.
[5] Pliny, Natural History, Book 10.22 translated in Loeb, Pliny Natural History, 1938, p. 321.
