Temple of Zeus, Altar

The Temple of Zeus is the largest Doric Temple in the West end it has original architectural solutions. According to a passage of Diodoro Siculo, it was immediately built after the Battle of Himera (480 BC), which indicates the victory of the Greek cities of Sicily over Carthaginians.
According to ancient sources, besides, the construction of the temple was never completed.The building was situated on a huge rectangular platform (56,30x113,45 meters), over which raised a base of five steps (crepidoma), of which the last was high twice than the others and formed a sort of high podium isolating the temple from the surrounding environment.The Doric building did not have usual free columns, but a fence wall in which took place demi-columns,
seven on the short sides and fourteen on the long sides, in which others rectangular pillars were inside. The demi-columns, based on a plinth, had a diameter lower than four meters and was not composed of monolithic rocks, but of small wedge-cropped blocks and fan shaped. The hypothetical height of the columns was evaluated over 18 meters.The demi-columns had Doric capitals. Among the ruins of the temple are visible elements of the frieze with smooth and grooved slabs (metopes end triglyphs); while fragments of the eaves Leonida head shaped, are exhibited in the Archaeological Museum.The ancient historian Diodoro Siculo tells that on the pediments were sculpted Gigantomachia (struggle between the gods and the Giants) on one hand, and the conquest of Troy on the other. The placement of the Giants is problematic, 7.65 meters high and built in blocks, which we assume they were outside the temple, placed in inter-columns on high corbels around 11 meters; the rebuilding of one of these giant figures is exposed in the Archaeological Museum. Nearby the east front of the temple, there are the remains of the monumental rectangular altar, on which took place religious rituals, characterized by great sacrifices of animals.