The temple was built centrally on a prepared terrace measuring 60 x 70 metres. The temple, originally dedicated to Zeus, was built for Emperor Trajan and completed by his successor Hadrian after his death in Selinus. It was accessible from the south via an open staircase on a 2.90 metre high podium.

Godfather Zeus is the supreme Olympic god of Greek mythology and more powerful than all other Greek gods combined. Zeus is usually represented with a sceptre and a bundle of lightning. Above him stood only the personified fate - his daughters, the moirs. He also had to submit to them.
Zeus was married to his sister Hera, with whom he had four children... But he also had many affairs, among others with the goddess Leto, a daughter of the titan Koios, who gave birth to Apollo, the god of light and music, and Artemis, the healing goddess of nature and hunting, or Leda, from whom he got the dioscuri Castor and Polydeukes.

Marcus Ulpius Traianus (* 18. September 53; † 8. August 117 in Selinus, today Gazipaşa), known as Trajan, was Roman Emperor from January 98 to 117.
Trajan, the first Roman emperor to come from a province, is considered the best Roman Princeps (optimus princeps) in historiography traditionally written by senators. After the last years of Domitian's reign, which were marked by the persecutions and executions of Roman senators, and the end of the Flavian dynasty, the short reign of his predecessor, Nerva, and especially Trajan, established adoptive emperorship.
With the conquest of Armenia, Mesopotamia and above all the Dacian Empire, the Roman Empire experienced its greatest expansion under his rule. In terms of domestic policy, Trajan aimed to strengthen Italy and promote Romanisation in the provinces of the empire through extensive building and social measures.