Some Ars Goetia demons confess something disturbing: that before they fell they were angels —and not of just any rank, but of a specific choir. But it must be said honestly from the start: most of the seventy-two declare no choir at all. This is the reconstruction of the few who spoke —with their source and date—.
Dividing heaven into nine choirs is not Goetic: it is Christian angelology, fixed by Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite around the year 500 in «The Celestial Hierarchy», in three triads: Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones (highest); Dominations, Virtues, Powers (middle); Principalities, Archangels, Angels (lowest). Gregory the Great proposed a slightly different order; both coexisted in the Middle Ages.
According to Gregory, the Virtues are «those spirits through whom signs and miracles are most often worked». Two demons expressly declare they were Virtues: Agares (2nd spirit) and Barbatos (8th). The very force of wonders… turned downward.
Declared by Paimon (9th) and Marchosias (35th). With a discrepancy worth naming: Weyer adds Balam to this choir, but the later Goetia no longer keeps it.
With bitter irony, it is the choir with the MOST declared fallen —four—: Beleth (13th), Gaap (33rd), Vual (47th) and Crocell/Crokel (49th; «Procel» in variants and Weyer). Those who chained demons… chained.
The confession reaches both ends of the hierarchy. From the Thrones —the seat of judgement, in the highest triad— fell Raum (40th). And from the Angels —the messengers, the lowest choir— fell Caim (53rd). With them, the choirs with declared fallen demons are five, not three.
This calls for precision. One declares a double origin himself: Murmur (54th) says he was «partly of the Order of Thrones and partly of Angels». Others only touch it through their legions: Purson (20th), partly Virtues and partly Thrones; Forneus (30th), partly Thrones and partly Angels; and the legions of Paimon, partly Angels and partly Powers. Only in Weyer (1577), and no longer in the later Goetia: Amy (58th), partly Angels and partly Powers; and Belial, partly Virtues and partly Angels.
If they fell, why do they keep the gifts of their former choir? Thomas Aquinas answered: by glory, demons are no longer in any angelic order; but by nature they keep their gifts —intellect, power, hierarchy—. They lost grace, not their capacities. Miracle without God; power without glory.
This is not a closed system: the Goetic grimoires do not distribute the seventy-two among the nine choirs. Only a handful confess their origin —five choirs with direct fallen (Thrones, Dominations, Virtues, Powers and Angels) and a few cases by legions—, and this page follows only what the texts say —Ars Goetia, Weyer's Pseudomonarchia, Pseudo-Dionysius, Gregory and Aquinas—, for historical study.
→ See: Pseudo-Dionysius · Chronology · Myths debunked · the 72 spirits
grimorium.lat · Documentary library of ritual magic, demonology and historical grimoires