Archangel Asiel, Timor Dei

Asiel, whose name is glossed "Timor Dei" — the Fear of God — beneath many surviving copies, was one of the most frequently reproduced names in the arquebusier-angel canon, rivaling Eliel and Uriel across colonial workshops. Like his militia siblings, he stands in courtier's dress with a matchlock gun at parade rest, an angel painted as a Habsburg soldier rather than a scriptural messenger. The "Timor Dei" epithet reframes the gun itself — not a weapon of conquest, but an instrument of reverent awe, heaven's own discipline made visible. It is a small but telling piece of theological retrofitting: an imported colonial technology, repurposed as a virtue. Notice the exact curl of the plume and the lace at the collar — the tailoring is as considered as the theology.

Maker

Cusco School (anonymous)

Date

c. 1750

Medium of the original

Oil on canvas

Original held by

Via Wikimedia Commons (public domain — anonymous 18th-century work, published pre-1931); illustrated in a Christie's Latin American Art auction record

Credit

Via Wikimedia Commons (public domain — anonymous 18th-century work, published pre-1931); illustrated in a Christie's Latin American Art auction record

Rights

Public domain, verified

Catalogue number

PA-00138