147. ... more marble from the Musei Capitolini

The Musei Capitolini houses a vast collection of ( primarily ... ) Roman antiquities displayed in two of the three buildings that enclose Piazza del Campioglio - Palazzo dei Conservatori and Palazzo Nuovo ( the third building is Palazzo Senatorio - now the Rome Town Hall ). These two buildings are linked by an underground tunnel that leads into the ancient Tabularium ( office that housed the official records of ancient Rome ... ) that overlooks the Roman Forum. 

In blog #145 I explored the Palazzo dei Conservatori, and now it's down into the basement and across under the Piazza and into the Palazzo Nuovo.

 Palazzo Nuovo

The huge Tabularium underneath the Piazza.

Here in ancient times was the records office of Rome 

and also the offices of many city officials ...

View of the Roman Forum from inside the Museum -

 - a vast area of excavated Roman temples, 

squares and government buildings - 

some dating back 2000 years ...

 The Palazzo Nuovo houses the collections of ancient sculptures assembled in the past by the Roman nobility and in more recent times, the collections amassed by the various popes of the church and donated to the Musei Capitolini from the late 15 Century onwards ... various other works discovered during archeological excavations carried out as new urban districts were being built have also been added to the collection.

 Mars: Pyrrhus

the god of war and guardian of agriculture ...

 Satyr of the Valley

Statue of  Polyphemus

 

 Fountain with the river-god Marforio

detail

 Hall of Gladiators

 Dying Gaul

 Hall of Philosophers

 Hall of the Emperors

 Capitoline Venus

 and seated directly opposite the Venus is this rather dour figure...

Old Drunk

 Hercules as the slayer of the Hydra of Lerna

Hermaphroditus

 ... the two-sexed child of Aphrodite and Hermes 

had long been a symbol of androgyny 

and was portrayed in Greco-Roman art as a female figure with male genitals.

Such an extraordinary exhibition of statuary - and I have shown you only a fraction of the collection ... than goodness the Popes liked collecting art ...