The present Hathor temple began construction in 54 BCE under Ptolemy XII Auletes, and the hypostyle hall was built under Tiberius. Earlier buildings stood on the site, with a possible one around 2250 BCE, a temple by about 1500 BCE, and the mammisi of Nectanebo II, the earliest surviving building, around 360 to 343 BCE.
The Hathor temple has a large and a small hypostyle hall, a treasury, an offering hall and shrines to Isis, Sokar, Harsomtus, Hathor and Ihy. The complex also holds the Temple of the Birth of Isis, a sacred lake, a sanatorium, a Roman mammisi and the gateways of Domitian and Trajan. Twelve crypts have reliefs dated as late as Ptolemy XII.
A processional staircase to the roof is known as the melted stairs. The Dendera zodiac was removed in 1820 and is now in the Louvre, and accounts differ on whether removal was authorized. Restoration began in 2005, paused in 2011 and resumed in 2017.
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