Venetians reconstructing a gold-covered barge used by the doges of Venice until it was reduced to ashes by Napoleon have appealed to President Sarkozy of France to contribute to the cost “by way of reparation”.

The foundation behind the €20 million (£15 million) project wants France to make a financial contribution to compensate for what has been described as the wilful destruction of the barge, which was set ablaze during Napoleon's occupation of Venice in 1798.

The Fondazione Bucintoro has written to President Sarkozy to ask France to contribute as a goodwill gesture to make amends for Napoleon's “vandalism”.

The elaborate and imposing ducal barge, known as the Bucintoro, was a symbol both of the doge's power and of the Venetian Republic's mystical relationship with the sea and its once-extensive empire. The origin of the name is obscure but is thought to combine burcio, a traditional Venetian term for a lagoon vessel, with in oro, meaning covered in gold.

Venetian scholars believe that there were four successive barges, with the earliest dating back to 1300. But the last one, 35m (115ft) long and more than 8m high, was the most magnificent, with the doge's throne in the stern and a figurehead representing Justice with sword and scales at the prow.

The barge, a two-deck floating palace, was propelled by 42 oars, each 11m long and manned by a team of four sailors. The main salon, covered in red velvet, seated 90, with 48 windows set in a vast, elaborately carved canopy or baldacchino.

The barge featured in an annual ceremony on Ascension Day in which the doge cast his gold ring into the waters of the Adriatic to symbolise Venice's union with the sea.

The destruction of the barge by fire after French forces had stripped the vessel of its gold remained “a painful thorn in the side of all Venetians”. It was small consolation that a few fragments that escaped the blaze had been preserved in Venice museums.

Construction of the replica will begin on March 15 at the Arsenale, once the mighty shipyards of “La Serenissima”, where the original ducal barge was housed.

Roberto D'Agostino, deputy head of Fondazione Bucintoro, said that the project would make meticulous use of the original materials, including larch and fir wood, and would even reproduce the gold decorations.

The foundation is sponsored by businessmen in the Veneto and Lombardy regions. Tourists, local residents and school groups will be encouraged to visit the Arsenale during construction and talk to Venetian boatbuilders involved in the project.

SPOILS OF WAR

— Capturing Venice at the end of the 18th century, Napoleon seized 20 paintings, 500 manuscripts and a classical bronze sculpture of horses from the famous St Mark's Cathedral. The Venetians themselves had looted it from Byzantium centuries earlier

— Napoleon's disastrous retreat from Moscow was caused, in part, by the amount of loot he allowed his men to carry, believing it to be a token of victory. Harried by Russian partisans, troops abandoned gold as they crossed corpse-strewn battlefields

— During the Second Opium War of 1860, French and British troops occupied the Summer Palace in Beijing, burning its legendary pleasure garden, the Garden of Perfect Brightness. Three bronze statues were returned to China last year after being bought at auction

Sources: Museum Security Network; Arlington Learning in Retirement Institute; Times archives

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