The
Temple of Zeus at Olympia was an ancient
Greek templeGreek temples were structures built to house deity statues within Greek sanctuaries in Greek paganism. The temples themselves did usually not directly serve a cult purpose, since the sacrifices and rituals dedicated to the respective deity took place outside them...
in
Olympia, GreeceOlympia , a sanctuary of ancient Greece in Elis, is known for having been the site of the Olympic Games in classical times, comparable in importance to the Pythian Games held in Delphi. Both games were held every Olympiad , the Olympic Games dating back possibly further than 776 BC...
, dedicated to the chief of the gods,
ZeusIn the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...
. It was the very model of the fully developed classical Greek temple of the
Doric orderThe Doric order was one of the three orders or organizational systems of ancient Greek or classical architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian.-History:...
. The temple, built between 472 and 456 BCE, stood in the most famous sanctuary of Greece, which had been dedicated to local and Pan-Hellenic deities and had probably been established towards the end of the
Mycenaean periodMycenaean Greece was a cultural period of Bronze Age Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece. Athens, Pylos, Thebes, and Tiryns are also important Mycenaean sites...
. The
Altis, the enclosure with its
sacred groveA sacred grove is a grove of trees of special religious importance to a particular culture. Sacred groves were most prominent in the Ancient Near East and prehistoric Europe, but feature in various cultures throughout the world...
, open-air altars and the
tumulusA tumulus is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds, Hügelgrab or kurgans, and can be found throughout much of the world. A tumulus composed largely or entirely of stones is usually referred to as a cairn...
of
PelopsIn Greek mythology, Pelops , was king of Pisa in the Peloponnesus. He was the founder of the House of Atreus through his son of that name....
, was first formed during the tenth and ninth centuries BCE
Greece's "Dark Age"The Greek Dark Age or Ages also known as Geometric or Homeric Age are terms which have regularly been used to refer to the period of Greek history from the presumed Dorian invasion and end of the Mycenaean Palatial civilization around 1200 BC, to the first signs of the Greek city-states in the 9th...
, when the cult of Zeus was joined to the already establish cult here of Hera.
It housed the renowned
statue of ZeusThe Statue of Zeus at Olympia was made by the Greek sculptor Phidias, circa 432 BC on the site where it was erected in the Temple of Zeus, Olympia, Greece. It was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.-Description:...
, which was one of the
Seven Wonders of the Ancient WorldThe Seven Wonders of the World refers to remarkable constructions of classical antiquity listed by various authors in guidebooks popular among the ancient Hellenic tourists, particularly in the 1st and 2nd centuries BC...
. The
ChryselephantineChryselephantine is a term that refers to the sculptural medium of gold and ivory...
statue was approximately 13 m (43 ft) high and was made by the sculptor
PhidiasPhidias or the great Pheidias , was a Greek sculptor, painter and architect, who lived in the 5th century BC, and is commonly regarded as one of the greatest of all sculptors of Classical Greece: Phidias' Statue of Zeus at Olympia was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World...
in his workshop on the site at Olympia. He took about twelve years to complete it. On his head was a sculpted wreath of olive sprays. In his right hand he held a figure of
NikeIn Greek mythology, Nike was a goddess who personified victory, also known as the Winged Goddess of Victory. The Roman equivalent was Victoria. Depending upon the time of various myths, she was described as the daughter of Pallas and Styx and the sister of Kratos , Bia , and Zelus...
, the goddess of victory, also made from ivory and gold, and in his left hand, a scepter made with many kinds of metal, with an eagle perched on the top. His sandals were made of gold and so was his robe. His garments were carved with animals and with lilies. The throne was decorated with gold, precious stones, ebony, and ivory. The statue was the most famous artistic work in Greece.
The temple was constructed by the architect
LibonLibon was a 5th century BC Greek architect. Born in Elis, he built the Doric temple to Zeus at Olympia in about 460 BC. Libon, through his work on the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, is said to have inspired the technique and design of the Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis - though this was obviously...
, with carved
metopesIn classical architecture, a metope is a rectangular architectural element that fills the space between two triglyphs in a Doric frieze, which is a decorative band of alternating triglyphs and metopes above the architrave of a building of the Doric order...
and
triglyphTriglyph is an architectural term for the vertically channeled tablets of the Doric frieze, so called because of the angular channels in them, two perfect and one divided, the two chamfered angles or hemiglyphs being reckoned as one. The square recessed spaces between the triglyphs on a Doric...
friezes, topped by
pedimentA pediment is a classical architectural element consisting of the triangular section found above the horizontal structure , typically supported by columns. The gable end of the pediment is surrounded by the cornice moulding...
s filled with sculptures in the
Severe StyleThe severe style, or Early Classic style, was the dominant idiom of Greek sculpture in the period ca. 490 to 450 BCE. It marks the breakdown of the canonical forms of archaic art and the transition to the greatly expanded vocabulary and expression of the classical moment of the late 5th century...
, now attributed to the "
Olympia MasterThe Olympia Master is the name given to the anonymous sculptor responsible for the external sculpture of the Temple of Zeus, Olympia. From what Pausanias tells us of the dates of the Temple, the Master and his workshop were active between 470 and 457 BCE The two pediments and the series of metopes...
" and his studio.
The main structure of the building was of a local limestone that was unattractive and of poor quality, and so it was coated with a thin layer of
stuccoStucco or render is a material made of an aggregate, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as decorative coating for walls and ceilings and as a sculptural and artistic material in architecture...
to give it an appearance of marble. All the sculptural decoration on the temple was made of
Parian marbleParian marble is a fine-grained semitranslucent pure-white and entirely flawless marble quarried during the classical era on the Greek island of Paros in the Aegean Sea.It was highly prized by ancient Greeks for making sculptures...
, and the roof tiles were of the same Pentelic marble used to build the
ParthenonThe Parthenon is a temple on the Athenian Acropolis, Greece, dedicated to the Greek goddess Athena, whom the people of Athens considered their virgin patron. Its construction began in 447 BC when the Athenian Empire was at the height of its power. It was completed in 438 BC, although...
at
AthensAthens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
.
The unifying theme of
iconographyIconography is the branch of art history which studies the identification, description, and the interpretation of the content of images. The word iconography literally means "image writing", and comes from the Greek "image" and "to write". A secondary meaning is the painting of icons in the...
of the temple is the
dike or justice based on custom, as represented by Zeus, its upholder.
The east pediment, erroneously attributed to
PaeoniusPaeonius of Mende in Macedonia was a Greek sculptor of the late 5th century BC. The only work that can be definitely attributed to him is the statue of Nike discovered at Olympia...
by
PausaniasPausanias was a Greek traveler and geographer of the 2nd century AD, who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. He is famous for his Description of Greece , a lengthy work that describes ancient Greece from firsthand observations, and is a crucial link between classical...
, who gave a detailed account of its sculptures in the late second century CE, depicted the myth of the chariot race between
PelopsIn Greek mythology, Pelops , was king of Pisa in the Peloponnesus. He was the founder of the House of Atreus through his son of that name....
and
OenomausIn Greek mythology, King Oenomaus of Pisa, the father of Hippodamia, was the son of Ares, either by the naiad Harpina or by Sterope, one of the Pleiades, whom some identify as his consort instead...
, with Zeus standing in the centre, flanked by standing pairs of heroes and heroines, and the two chariot groups, with recumbent figures in the corners. Hippodameia and her maid stand to Zeus' left (north), and
PelopsIn Greek mythology, Pelops , was king of Pisa in the Peloponnesus. He was the founder of the House of Atreus through his son of that name....
to Zeus' right. A great part of all fifteen figures has been recovered, in carefully documented excavations; scholars still discuss the placement and interrelationships of six seated or kneeling figures in the composition, and their specific identifications.
The west pediment depicted the Centauromachy, the fight at the wedding of Peirithoos between the Lapiths and the
centaurIn Greek mythology, a centaur or hippocentaur is a member of a composite race of creatures, part human and part horse...
s, who had violated
xeniaXenia is the Greek concept of hospitality, or generosity and courtesy shown to those who are far from home. It is often translated as "guest-friendship" because the rituals of hospitality created and expressed a reciprocal relationship between guest and host.The Greek god Zeus sometimes referred...
, the sacred rules of hospitality that support the social norms.
ApolloApollo is one of the most important and complex of the Olympian deities in Greek and Roman mythology...
stood in the centre, flanked by Peirithoos and
TheseusFor other uses, see Theseus Theseus was the mythical founder-king of Athens, son of Aethra, and fathered by Aegeus and Poseidon, both of whom Aethra had slept with in one night. Theseus was a founder-hero, like Perseus, Cadmus, or Heracles, all of whom battled and overcame foes that were...
. Peirithoos, king of the Lapiths has invited the centaurs to a wedding celebration. The centaurs get drunk and kidnap the women. Perithoos succeeds in defeating them. The Lapiths have been taken to represent the civilised Olympian order of the Greeks themselves, while the Centaurs represent primitive nature of
chthonicChthonic designates, or pertains to, deities or spirits of the underworld, especially in relation to Greek religion. The Greek word khthon is one of several for "earth"; it typically refers to the interior of the soil, rather than the living surface of the land or the land as territory...
beings; the frieze also reminded fifth-century Greeks of their
victory over the PersiansThe Greco-Persian Wars were a series of conflicts between the Achaemenid Empire of Persia and city-states of the Hellenic world that started in 499 BC and lasted until 449 BC. The collision between the fractious political world of the Greeks and the enormous empire of the Persians began when Cyrus...
, "outsider" threateners of the Hellenic order. The statue of Apollo (currently in the Archaeological Museum of Olympia) was depicted on the
obverseObverse and its opposite, reverse, refer to the two flat faces of coins and some other two-sided objects, including paper money, flags , seals, medals, drawings, old master prints and other works of art, and printed fabrics. In this usage, obverse means the front face of the object and reverse...
of the Greek 1000
drachmasDrachma, pl. drachmas or drachmae was the currency used in Greece during several periods in its history:...
banknote of 1987-2001.
The
pronaos and
opisthodomosAn opisthodomos can refer to either the rear room of an ancient Greek temple or to the inner shrine, also called the adyton ; the confusion arises from the lack of agreement in ancient inscriptions. In modern scholarship, it usually refers to the rear porch of a temple...
, the entrance portico and the balancing false portico at the rear, were constructed
in antis, with six metopes at either end, carved with the 12 labours of Heracles, in which Heracles successfully defeats a series of creatures and monsters that threaten righteous order.
The Roman general Mummius dedicated twenty-one gilded shields after he sacked Corinth in 146 BCE; they were hung upon the columns. In 426 CE,
Theodosius IITheodosius II , commonly surnamed Theodosius the Younger, or Theodosius the Calligrapher, was Byzantine Emperor from 408 to 450. He is mostly known for promulgating the Theodosian law code, and for the construction of the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople...
ordered the destruction of the sanctuary, and earthquakes in 522 and 551 devastated the ruins and left the Temple of Zeus partially buried.
The site of the ancient sanctuary, long forgotten under landslips and flood siltation, was identified in 1766. In 1829 a French team partially excavated the Temple of Zeus, taking several fragments of the pediments to the Musée du Louvre. Systematic excavation began in 1875, under the direction the German Archaeological Institute, and has continued, with some interruptions, to the present time.
In Film
The 1997 Disney animated film Hercules depicts the Temple of Zeus as the only communication Hercules has with his father while he is a mortal. Zeus communicates by possessing the statue within the temple. In an episode of the
animated seriesHercules is an animated series based on the 1997 film of the same name and the Greek myth. The series follows teenage Hercules training as a hero as well as trying to adjust to life. With his free-spirited friend Icarus, his future-seeing friend Cassandra and his teacher Philoctetes , he battles...
, Zeus further uses this ability to address an issue on Earth by using the statue to visit other cities near Athens.
See also
- Elis
Elis, or Eleia is an ancient district that corresponds with the modern Elis peripheral unit...
- Architecture of Ancient Greece
The architecture of Ancient Greece is the architecture produced by the Greek-speaking people whose culture flourished on the Greek mainland and Peloponnesus, the Aegean Islands, and in colonies in Asia Minor and Italy for a period from about 900 BC until the 1st century AD, with the earliest...
- Greek temple
Greek temples were structures built to house deity statues within Greek sanctuaries in Greek paganism. The temples themselves did usually not directly serve a cult purpose, since the sacrifices and rituals dedicated to the respective deity took place outside them...
- List of Greco-Roman roofs
- Apollon of Olympia
The Apollon of Olympia was part of the group of sculptures found in the west pediment of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia. Its original location also provides it with another name: the Apollon from the west pediment. It is one of the most important statues of the Severe style or early Classical...
External links