A colossal size statue of Jupiter is seated on a rectangular padded seat. He once held a thunderbolt on his lap and a long scepter by his side. His right leg is pulled back against the seat, while his left foot is firmly planted on the plinth. Both feet are shod in strapped sandals. He wears a himation wrapped about his hips with one end thrown over his outstretched left arm, leaving his powerful, muscled chest and abdomen bare. His beard is long with curly locks, and he has a full mustache. A wide flat fillet encircles his head.

Although the statue was carved in a Roman workshop in the first century A.D., the inspiration for this image of Jupiter was a Greek sculpture of the 430s B.C., the monumental gold and ivory statue of Zeus created by the sculptor Pheidias (active 470-420 B.C.) for Zeus's temple at Olympia. Pheidias's Zeus was renowned in antiquity. Considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, many ancient writers praised it and numerous sculptors copied it.

The Getty’s monumental statue was discovered in the 1500s on the grounds of the imperial estate at Tivoli, near Rome. By the 1570s, the statue served as the decorative centerpiece of the Fountain of the Dragon at the Villa d’Este in Tivoli. In 1781 the work was sold to James Hugh Smith Barry and became part of his sculpture collection at Marbury Hall in England. Since then it has been called the Marbury Hall Zeus. The statue was restored in the 18th century with new additions carved to complete the nose, hair locks, drapery folds, and right hand. These were removed by conservators in 1973.

— J. Paul Getty Museum, in: getty.edu