The buildings and pagan temples of the sanctuary at Olympia, disused since the banning of the Olympic Games by the emperor Theodosius I in 393, are demolished in 426 on the orders of Theodosius II.

The fate of the statue of Zeus, made in around 430-422 BCE by the famed Greek sculptor, painter, and architect Phidias, is a source of debate: the eleventh-century Eastern Roman historian Georgios Kedrenos recorded the tradition that it was carried off to Constantinople, where in 475 it was destroyed in the great fire of the Lauseion.

Others argue that it perished in 425 with the temple when it burned.