Dodona was a sanctuary that was at first regional, later interstate, and developed into a polis. It lies in the centre of a valley dominated to the south-west by Mount Tomaros, today's Olytsika, with twin peaks (1,972 m and 1,816 m), and by the so-called "hundred springs". The site was dedicated to the oracular cult of Zeus Dodonaios, whose beginnings at the sanctuary are uncertain. A small prehistoric settlement developed on the site at the beginning of the Bronze Age (3100–1100 BC). By the 8th century BC the sanctuary was already widely known, as it is mentioned in the Homeric texts. Fragments of iron and bronze tripods of the 9th and 8th centuries BC have been found in the area of the ancient open-air precinct that preceded the construction of the first temple of Zeus. The finds confirm the tradition that cauldrons (lebetes) and tripods surrounded the great sacred oak, whose rustling leaves and the echoing sound of the cauldrons and tripods, caused by the wind, were interpreted as the oracle of Zeus (Dakaris, 2003: 14).
Most scholars accept that, before the cult of Zeus, a deity related to nature and fertility – the Mother of the Gods or Mother Earth – was worshipped at the site. The cult of Zeus emerged alongside this older one. Mother Earth came to be called Dione, a name derived from that of her consort Zeus. The god was worshipped at Dodona as Naios ("Dweller"), a direct reference to the cult of the deity at the oracle of the oak.
Dodona was the religious and political centre of the ancient peoples of Epirus. The site was annexed by the Molossians before the end of the 5th century BC, or between the 5th and 4th centuries BC, becoming the meeting place of the Molossian koinon (Quantin, 2008: 43-44). It was under the Molossians that Dodona underwent a change in its landscape and political geography (Quantin, 2008: 45).
Copies of the decrees of the koinon were displayed at Dodona. From these inscriptions we know about the main institutions and the most important magistrates, but we have no information about the institutions of the city itself (Hansen and Nielsen, 2004:343-344).
The sanctuary lies on the south-western slopes of a low hill, on three levels. The entrance is on the south and was lined by stoai. The main area, with the temple of Zeus and other cult buildings, developed on a spacious terrace on the slopes of the hill. To the west were built the bouleuterion, the prytaneion, the theatre and the stadium. To the north, the top of the hill was enclosed by the acropolis. A large wall surrounded the main sanctuary. Inscribed pedestals bearing votive statues and decrees stood along the façades and the stoai. Outside the peribolos of the sanctuary were the theatre and the stadium, related to the Naia, a festival with athletic, musical and dramatic contests in honour of Zeus.
The sanctuary took its final form in the 3rd century BC. When Christianity prevailed, the sanctuary declined. A Christian church was built over the ruins of the sanctuary in the 5th century AD.