In the several years before and after 1750, Giambattista Tiepolo painted three replicas after Paolo Veronese, one each of versions of Paolo’s Rape of Europa, Finding of Moses and Christ in the House of Simon. Why did the greatest painter in eighteenth-century Europe spend hours studying a trio of Veronese’s works and then methodically execute copies after them while responding to an increasing number of patrons besieging him for new paintings? This study bears down as well upon a pair of larger issues, copying itself and the bonds of friendship, here interdependent upon one another. That the famous, well-off and middle-aged Tiepolo produced duplicates was unusual; in the Early Modern period, only the renowned Rubens did likewise but for quite other reasons. No one disdains him for replicating Titian, and Tiepolo unquestionably merits the same regard for responding to the Cinquecento. Giambattista’s ‘Veronese duplicates’ might today be called ‘throwaways’, and they did little or nothing for his fame and wealth during his lifetime. But understanding their roots and early contexts explains why the famous artist willingly made them, and why – generally – patrons wanted copies. Exploring Tiepolo’s three after Veronese reveals that the eighteenth-century master was a far more complex artistic personality than supposed, that replicas are not a monolithic group – each one requiring a probing investigation – and that friendship might stimulate art as it does a good deal of what we undertake.