Michelangelo designed a very handsome plaza surrounded by buildings on three sides. The Senate building is in the center facing the staircase leading up to the plaza. Today it houses Rome's city hall. Behind the building, largely inaccessible, is the Tarpeian Rock, a big cliff overlooking the Forum, where criminals would be thrown to their death before the Romans built the Colosseum and devised more fun ways to kill people. Flanking the Senate on both sides is the Capitoline Museum, housing one of Italy's best sculpture collections. There are lots of odd bits and pieces of obviously larger than life pieces from ancient Rome, as well as many rooms dedicated to the more subtle charms of Renaissance sculpture. It started to rain while we were here, one of the few rainy days of our whole trip, so we spent quite a bit of time here. But it's well worth it, both for the beauty of the collection and the buildings housing it. And if you're bored by the museums, he piazza has fantastic views over the rooftops of Rome