59 Elpis is a large main belt asteroid that orbits the Sun with a period of 4.47 years.

In the Tholen scheme it has a classification of CP, while Bus and Binzen class it as type B.

Urbain Le Verrier, director of the Paris Observatory, at first refused to allow Chacornac to name the object, because Leverrier was promoting a plan to reorganize asteroid nomenclature by naming them after their discoverers, rather than mythological figures.

Littrow chose Elpis, a Greek personification of hope, in reference to the favorable political conditions in Europe at the time.

In 1862, Leverrier permitted Chacornac to choose a name, and he selected "Olympia" at the suggestion of John Russell Hind.