The Archangel Michael

This panel is one of three that come from the lower tier of an altarpiece made for the Duke of Milan. The other two – The Virgin and Child with an Angel and The Archangel Raphael with Tobias – are also in our collection.The Archangel Michael stands triumphant after his cosmic battle with the devil (Revelation 12: 16). He was often shown as a youth wearing armour, with large elaborate wings. A pair of scales, hanging on the tree stump to the left, are a symbol of Michael’s role in the judgement of souls after death, when good and evil deeds were weighed up. Perugino has signed the painting just below the tree stump: PETRVS PERVSINV(S) / PINXIT.Depictions of Michael often show him dressed in armour trampling the devil (look at panels by Piero della Francesca and Bermejo, for example). You can still see part of the body of the devil here: his long, curved horn is hooked over Michael’s foot, his black wing against his shield. The rest was lost when the panel was cut down in the eighteenth century, but a painted copy, made before this, records its original appearance. Perugino planned the armour in a detailed drawing, now in the Royal Library, Windsor: it is almost identical to the final painted version, down to the strap which ties the breastplate to the tunic. The drawing is highlighted with strokes of white paint to indicate the areas that reflect the light, showing just how concerned Perugino was with getting the texture of the armour right. Michael’s pose may be inspired by Donatello’s sculpture of the youthful Saint George, made for the church of the Orsanmichele in Florence (Museo del Bargello, Florence). The sculpture, which Perugino would certainly have known, shows the saint as a boy and a hero who is like Michael, both gentle and strong.Later in the eighteenth century, after it had already been reduced in size, the painting was cut in half and the upper half was cut at each edge, reducing the size of the wings; we don't know why. The two halves were reunited before the picture entered our collection, through the fragments of the wings were never recovered. By that time they had been replaced, so the outer edges of the wings that we see today are not original.