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Mrs. Jameson, in writing of this subject, says, “Infinitely more beautiful and consistent are the nondescript wings which the early painters gave their angels: large,—so large that, when the glorious creature is represented as at rest, they droop from the shoulders to the ground; 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.”

It is interesting to note that wings were used by the artists of ancient Egypt, Babylon, Nineveh, and Etruria as symbols of might, majesty, and divine beauty.

The representation of great numbers of angels, surrounding the Deity, the Trinity, or the glorified Virgin, is known as a Glory of Angels, and is most expressive and poetical when æsthetically portrayed. A Glory, when properly represented, is composed of the hierarchies of angels in circles, each hierarchy in its proper order. Complete Glories, with nine circles, are exceedingly rare. Many artists contented themselves with two or three, and sometimes but a single circle, thus symbolizing the symbol of the Glory.