St. Francis was still alive when a group of friars from his order arrived in Venice in 1222. They remained without a fixed residence for about 30 years, until the Doge Tiepolo gave them an abandoned abbey on a vast tract of land in the San Polo sestiere. The Friars replaced the abbey's old church with a newer building which served them until the huge Gothic temple you see today was completed in the 1400s, culminating a century of work. Known locally as I Frari, it's believed to have been designed by architect and Franciscan friar Scipione Bon, also known as Beato Pacifico, whose portrait is in the right transept beneath his funeral monument.

Abstinence and poverty were fundamental tenets of the Franciscan order, an austerity that echoes from plain russet-color walls. (Look closely and you'll find them painted in a faux-brick pattern.) Save for its richly carved choir stalls, the church was always known for its relative absence of artwork, but paradoxically, I Frari does contain a few of the most sumptuously brilliant paintings in any Venetian church, including the magnificent Titian altarpieces, which are among the most dazzling works this prolific artist produced. Visit the sacristy first, to see Giovanni Bellini's 1488 triptych Madonna and Child with Saints in all its mellow luminosity, painted for precisely that spot. Contrast this with the heroic energy of Titian's large Assumption over the main altar -- painted little more than 30 years later -- to appreciate the rapid development of Venetian Renaissance painting. This work caused a sensation when unveiled in 1518 and was immediately acclaimed for its winning combination of Venetian color -- especially the glowing reds -- and classical Roman figure style. It was said that this piece raised Venetian painting to the level of art being produced for the pope. Many believe Titian made an even greater artistic stride in his subsequent painting, the Madonna di Ca' Pesaro (in left nave). It took almost 10 years to complete and was created for nobleman Jacopo Pesaro in gratitude for victory over the Turks. Looking at the Madonna, modeled after the artist's wife who died soon afterward in childbirth, it's hard to appreciate the radical break from convention she represented, but it was unheard of in Titian's time to move the Virgin out of picture center and portray the surrounding saints as active participants in the scene.

The church lost some of its asceticism when a number of grandiose 19th-century mausoleums were added. Especially conspicuous is the pyramid-shaped tomb of sculptor Antonio Canova (1757-1822), with its sleepy lion (perhaps hinting at Venice's captivity under the Austrians). Opposite this is an equally ponderous monument to Titian, a man so revered that Venetians exhumed his body from a communal grave used for plague victims. Conclude your visit with a look at the arrestingly realistic wooden sculpture St. John the Baptist, which Donatello made for the Florentine community in 1438.