CLEOPATRA

CLEOPATRA

AN EARLIER MODEL

AND IT IS THOUGHT SHE

MIGHT NOT BE AS BEAUTIFUL

AS WAS MADE OUT TO BE OR
WAS IT JUST A BAD ARTIST

Seven queens of Egypt were named Cleopatra. They were all intelligent and determined women but it was the last one who was the most celebrated.

William Shakespeare called her “the serpent of the Nile”.

The seventh Cleopatra (69-30BC) was unkindly treated by some historian especially by her Roman enemies.

In fact, she was a clever, well-educated, ambitious woman. She ruled her country wisely and was determined to regain the provinces Egypt had lost  Palestine and Syria.

Cleopatra came from Macedonia and Greek was her main language but she was the first one to learn Egyptian

Macedonia’s founder was Ptolemy I, who was one of Alexander the Great’s generals.  After Alexander’s death the empire broke apart and Ptolemy took Egypt. After Cleopatra was born her father Ptolemy XII, was just a puppet of Rome. 

In 51 BC Cleopatra ruled with her brother-husband, Ptolemy XII. She married him age 18 and he was 10 years. Cleopatra soon fell out with his council and left Alexandra.

JULIUS CAESAR

When Julius Caesar arrived looking for his rival Pompey. Cleopatra returned. According to historians, she arrived in a tiny boat wrapped in a carpet and was smuggled into the palace.

She persuaded Caesar to act as an arbiter and then as a champion in her quarrel with her brother.

He died during a following war, Cleopatra married her other brother, Ptolemy XIV, but Caesar was the father of her son Caesarion.

When Ptolemy died by sheer chance, she made the baby co-ruler as Ptolemy XV. Cleopatra joined Caesar in Rome. She stayed there till he was murdered in  44 BC.

Caesar installed a gold statue of Venus in the images of Cleopatra and Rome was scandalised.

Cleopatra’s downfall

Cleopatra was still determined to regain the province Palestine and Syria and used Roman might. She went to Tarsus (now Turkey) to meet Mark Antony. He was joined ruler with Julius Caesar’s great nephew Octavius. the emperor Augustus.

MARK ANTONY

Mark Antony fell in love with Cleopatra and they had three children. His divorced of Augustus’s sister Octavia. It caused Augustus to declare war on her in 32 BC.

After the defeat at the battle of Actium in 31 BC, Cleopatra and Mark fled to Egypt where they both committed suicide in 30 BC.