Olympia - Temple of Zeus

On the east pediment Zeus stands in the middle, flanked by King Oinomaos, his wife Sterope, his daughter Hippodameia and Hippodameia's future husband Pelops, before the chariot race in which Oinomaos lost both his throne and his life.

In the Temple of Zeus the metopes above the pronaos and opisthodomos depict the twelve labors of Herakles. Particularly fine are the metopes of Atlas and Augeias; some of the others are heavily restored or are casts of the originals (which were carried off by the French Expédition de Morée and are now in the Louvre).

The naos of the temple, in the pronaos of which is a mosaic of the fourth or third century B.C., had two rows of columns and housed the cult image of Zeus (after 438 B.C.). This huge chryselephantine statue, which depicted Zeus sitting on a richly decorated throne, was counted among the seven wonders of the world.

The west pediment at the Temple of Zeus shows Zeus's son Apollo in the middle, intervening imperiously in the battle between Lapiths and Centaurs which flared up at the marriage of Theseus's friend Peirithoos with Deidameia. Here the sculptor has broken the scene up into groups of two and three, whose violent movement is in sharp contrast to the tense tranquillity of the east pediment.