Napoleon filled his royal digs over Piazza San Marco with the riches of the doges, and took some of Venice's finest heirlooms to France as trophies. But the biggest treasure here couldn't be lifted: Jacopo Sansovino's 16th-century Libreria Nazionale Marciana , covered with larger-than-life philosophers by Veronese, Titian and Tintoretto and miniature back-flipping sea creatures.
Venice successfully reclaimed many ancient maps, statues, cameos and weapons, plus four centuries of artistic masterpieces in the Pinacoteca. Not to be missed are Paolo Veneziano's 14th-century sad-eyed saints (room 25); Lo Schiavone's Madonna with a bouncing baby Jesus, wearing a coral good-luck charm; Jacopo di Barbari's minutely detailed woodblock perspective view of Venice; an entire room of bright-eyed, peach-cheeked Bellini saints (room 36); and a wonderful anonymous 1784 portrait of champion rower Maria Boscola, five-time regatta winner (room 47). Temporary shows in the neoclassical ballroom are hit-and-miss, but Antonio Canova's 1777 statues of star-crossed lovers Orpheus and Eurydice are permanent scene-stealers.
