THE FALL OF THE DEMONS: VARIATIONS OF THE MOTIF IN MEDIEVAL RUSSIAN BOOKLORE AND ICONOGRAPHY

Abstract

This paper dwells upon the fall of the demons from heaven in Russian iconography. It covers the key concepts concerning the origin of the demons transmitted in medieval Russian booklore and their visualization in icons, fresco paintings and miniature paintings. The most important visual themes reflecting the idea of the angels’ transformation into demons as an outcome of a battle in heaven are as follows: a defeat from the heavenly host / Archangel Michael, falling into a river of fire, falling down to the Earth, etc. Russian iconography of the Final Judgement, finally emerging by the second half of the 15th century, came to be the visual compilation of these motifs. In Judgement scenes, demons are playing a wide spectrum of roles: losing the battle in heavens and falling down to the Earth in the beginning of times, fighting for human souls (waiting for the souls at the stations of ordeal, adding scrolls of a soul’s sins to the scale of righteousness, pursuing the angels that carry saved souls away and pushing the condemned into the hellfire), tormenting the sinners in various segments of hell and, finally, being themselves the eternal prisoners of the pit of hell. In the 17th century all these motifs, including that of the angels’ fall from heaven, will be elaborated upon in illuminated collections.