Angelo’s structure was destroyed by fire during the riots which attended the murder of Doge Pietro Candiano in 976. The rebuilding was undertaken by his successor, Pietro Orseolo, and completed towards the end of the eleventh century by Doge Selvo, who adorned the exterior with marble columns and the interior with mosaics. Doge Sebastiano Ziani extended the buildings in the late twelfth century. Early in the fourteenth, the E. portion of the S. façade was begun under the direction it is believed of the chief mason (_Prototaiapiera_), Pietro Basseggio, and in the course of about a century the S. wing was completed and the W. façade carried so far as the boundary of Ziani’s building. About 1365 Doge Marco Cornaro had the walls of the Hall of the Grand Council, the necessity for which had been the chief cause of the new buildings, painted with scenes from the story of the reconciliation of Pope Alexander and the Emperor Barbarossa, and the cornice decorated with portraits of the Doges so arranged that his own came exactly over the ducal chair. The Gothic additions made the simple edifice of Ziani look poor in comparison, and a strong desire was evoked to rebuild the old palace; but the Senate, chary of adding to the public burdens, forbade any member to make such a proposal under a fine of 1000 ducats. In 1419 fire injured the old edifice, and the good Doge Tomaso Mocenigo offered to pay the fine, and thus carried a proposal to rebuild Ziani’s portion of the Palace, which reached from the present Porta della Carta to the sixth arch and seventh column N. of the Adam and Eve angle. The Gothic building was completed between 1424 and 1439, under Doge Francesco Foscari, whose kneeling figure (restored) is carved over the Porta. The ornate façade on the east side, best seen from a gondola or from the Ponte di Canonico, is by Ant. Riccio, and was erected between 1483 and 1500. After the great fire of 1577, when the conflagration seemed “like Etna in eruption,” the whole structure narrowly escaped demolition to make place for a new building of Palladian architecture. The strenuous opposition of the architects Giovanni Rusconi and Antonio da Ponte alone saved it. The latter’s plans were accepted and the ruin was repaired and redecorated. The Bridge of Sighs is a later addition by Ant. Contino, about 1600. It is a commonplace structure, and none but commonplace criminals ever crossed it to their doom. The brick core of the palace may still be seen in the Cortile and from the Ponte della Paglia, on the eastern façade, where Riccio’s beautiful work ends. The sculptures at the three free angles, the Drunkenness of Noah, the Adam and Eve, and the Judgment of Solomon are placed S.E., S.W. and N.W. The group of the Judgment of Solomon is by two Tuscan sculptors, Pietro di Nicolo di Firenze and Giov. di Martino da Fiesole.