Builders Arsenal of Venice In service 1716 - 1797 | Preceded by Corona-class | |
Name Leon Trionfante ("Triumphant Lion") Operators Venetian Navy
French Navy Succeeded by San Carlo Borromeo-class | ||
The Leon Trionfante-class were a class of at least fourteen 70-gun third rate ships of the line built by the Venetian Arsenale from 1716 to 1785, in four different series with minor changes in the ships' length. Almost all the ships of this class were planned and started before 1739, completed to a 70%, then stored in the roofed shipbuilding docks of the Arsenale to be finished and launched when the Venetian Navy need them, a solution the Royal Navy adopted only in 1810, when the docks at Chatham were covered.
This decision, mostly due to the chronic lack of funds of the Serenissima in his last period, led the maintenance in service of older and inferior ships than the ones built at the same time for the British Royal Navy and the French Navy. Moreover, contemporary third rates had heavier guns (32-pounders on the gun deck and 18-pounders on the upper gun deck), even if the armament of those ships could be brought up to 72-74 guns. Excepting the Leon Trionfante and the Diligenza, none of this class' ships remained in service for more than fifteen years.
In 1797, when Venice fell to the French, Napoleon captured several ships of the class, still unfinished in the Arsenal: he chose one of them, forced the shipbuilders to have it completed and added it to his fleet en route for Egypt. After Campoformio, the remaining vessels were destroyed by the French to avoid their capture by the Austrian Empire.