They look two thousand years old and yet they are barely three hundred: the two crouching lions, their coats and muzzles smoothed by time, are of red Cottanello marble and were carved in 1722 by Giovanni Bonazza. In a city that counts lions by the thousand, these two have become the little lions par excellence, enough to give the square its name. Doge Alvise III Mocenigo had them placed within the remaking of the square designed by Andrea Tirali.