The Capitoline Hill overlooking the Forum was the site of the most important temple in ancient Rome, the Temple of Jupiter. This temple is gone now (some of its foundation can be seen in places), but in its place are the Piazza del Campidoglio and the Capitoline Museums. The museums house Roman sculpture (mostly ancient) and some newer paintings, but on our arrival, we discovered that we'd chosen to visit on a Monday, when the museum is closed. This left us with the Piazza to contemplate. Fortunately the Piazza was planned by Michelangelo, and there are some interesting things about it.

First, the Piazza is approached from the west by a sort of ramp-staircase, called the cordonata, which is wide enough and gradual enough for someone to ascend on horseback. More of a selling point in the 16th Century than in the 21st, but it was kind of nice to run into a stairway that was less steep than it could have been. The top of the cordonata is flanked by ancient Roman statues of Castor and Pollux.



The Piazza itself is laid out trapezoidally, with an open space surrounded by Palazzi with Michelangelo-designed elements in their façades. The Piazza was deliberately laid out to face away from the Forum (which is to the east) and toward the Vatican. Some of the Palazzi surrounding the Piazza are now occupied by the museums, but the one in the center, the Palazzo Senatorio, houses the current Rome town hall. The double staircase in front of the Palazzo Senatorio was designed by Michelangelo. Statues in front of the staircase represent the river gods of the Tiber and Nile, with the goddess Minerva appearing in the center.

The floor of the Piazza itself has an interesting pattern of tiles which was designed by Michelangelo but not implemented until 1940, under Mussolini. The center of the Piazza holds a bronze equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius which Michelangelo didn't like very much (he supplied a less-than-grandiose pedestal for it). The present statue is a copy, with the original in the Capitoline Museum.

To the left of the Palazzo Senatorio is a road leading to a nice (and free) overlook of the Forum. We took advantage of this and took a few photographs.



Then we looked at our watches (those of us that had watches, anyway) and observed that the St. Ignatius Church would be open, according to its posted hours. So we descended the cordonata and backtracked mostly to the north to find the church.