Zeus' Temple, Athens — Visitor Guide & Things to Do Nearby

The Temple of Olympian Zeus in Athens holds a record that says everything about the ambition behind it: construction began in the 6th century BC and wasn't finished until 131 AD, a building project that spanned nearly 700 years.

The temple was started by the Athenian tyrant Peisistratos around 515 BC, but work stalled after his sons were overthrown. Various rulers picked it up and put it down over the centuries, each finding the project too vast to complete. It took Roman Emperor Hadrian, a devoted admirer of Greek culture, to finally finish the job in 131 AD.

At its peak, the temple had 104 Corinthian columns, each standing 17 metres tall, making it the largest temple in ancient Greece. Hadrian placed a massive chryselephantine (gold and ivory) statue of Zeus inside and, not one to miss an opportunity, reportedly added a statue of himself alongside it.

Today, 15 of those original 104 columns still stand, with a 16th lying where it fell during a storm in 1852. Even in ruins, the scale is staggering. Standing among the columns with the Acropolis visible on the hill above, you get a sense of how overwhelming this temple must have been when it was intact.

The site is right in the centre of Athens, near Hadrian's Arch, which marked the boundary between the ancient city and Hadrian's new Roman quarter. If you're exploring Athens on a Questo quest, this is a spot where nearly seven centuries of ambition and ego are carved into the stone.