The Palace is called New because it was built from scratch, based on Michelangelo's project, to complete the design of the Capitoline square, in addition to the pre-existing Palazzo Senatorio and Palazzo dei Conservatori. The museum was inaugurated in 1734, under the pontificate of Clement XII, who the previous year had purchased the very important Albani collection of antiquities, consisting of 418 sculptures, for the Capitoline collections. These were added to the works already exhibited at the Vatican Belvedere and donated to the Campidoglio by Pope Pius V in 1566, as well as to the sculptures which year after year arrived on the hill and which no longer found a place in the Palazzo dei Conservatori.