Temple of Olympian Zeus, Athens

The Temple of Olympian Zeus is the vast ruined sanctuary you see here, an ancient Greek temple dedicated to Zeus. Its surviving Corinthian columns give the site its unmistakable vertical rhythm, while the broken foundations show how much of the building has disappeared. Construction began in the 6th century BC and was completed only in the 2nd century AD, after a project lasting about 638 years.

The temple eventually contained 104 colossal columns and ranked as the largest temple in Greece during the Roman period, with an enormous cult statue inside. Hadrian brought the long-delayed work to completion and formally dedicated the sanctuary in 132. Look at the remaining shafts: 16 original gigantic columns still stand among the ruins.

The building’s triumph did not last. A Germanic invasion in 267 AD led to its pillage, and the damaged temple was later dismantled as a source of stone for other construction in Athens. Libon is identified as its artist. What remains is therefore more than a broken monument: these immense columns preserve the scale of an ambition that survived political upheaval, changing rulers, and centuries of reuse.