INTRODUCTION C leopatra is one of the most famous women from ancient history and for good reason As the queen of Egypt she ruled the richest nation that bordered the Mediterranean Sea But she lost that throne at age twenty-one when she was driven into exile by her brother’s supporters and forced to flee Egypt for Syria She only regained the throne through an alliance to a powerful Roman named Julius Caesar Once she was restored to her throne however the drama did not end It continued with the murder of one and pos sibly two of her brothers clever plotting by Cleopatra to increase Egypt’s fortunes and armed conflict that ended in her death At a time when Egypt’s rulers distanced themselves from their subjects Cleopatra did not She was the only member of her family to learn the Egyptian language In her portraits she appeared wearing Egyptian dress One of her titles was Philopatris a word that means she who loves her coun try This love was returned by the Egyptian people among whom she was greatly popular As a woman ruler she made full use of all her gifts as a person and a descendant of her royal family Plutarch a biographer from antiquity described her as charming irre sistible and bewitching She was not a great beauty he said but her presence alone impressed everyone When she spoke It was a pleasure merely to hear the sound of her voice with which like an instrument of many strings she could pass from one language to another In fact Cleopatra spoke nine languages in all 6
INTRODUCTION 7 Though many people today remember Cleopatra for her beauty and charm she was also a powerful ruler who did not hesitate to order the deaths of her enemies
8 CLEOPATRA Cleopatra was not only smart and daring but ruthless and murderous Like other rulers in the ancient world she sent countless soldiers to die in her wars She sacrificed some of her own family to her ambitions as well During Cleopatra’s lifetime 69 30 BCE Egypt was more than a fabulously wealthy country It was also the last of the nations of the Mediterranean to keep its independence from the Roman Empire Rome the seat of the Roman Empire lies in the middle of the Italian peninsula From here streamed legions of soldiers They conquered modern-day North Africa Greece the Balkans Germany France Spain and Britain One of these conquerors Julius Caesar would play a large part in Cleopatra’s life So would Caesar’s com panion a powerful Roman general named Mark Antony Antony became Cleopatra’s husband and the father to three of her children She used all her power to keep Egypt free of Rome’s greedy grasp In the end her gamble failed When Julius Caesar was murdered civil war broke out Soon after Rome declared war on Egypt Cleopatra and Mark Antony joined their navies to fight a legendary battle They lost Both ended up dying by suicide In the years since her death the memory of Cleopa tra has lived on She has been a subject of poems plays books art and films However her fascinating true story rivals the fiction
CHAPTER ONE DAUGHTER OF THE NILE I n the fourth century BCE a conqueror emerged from the rocky highlands of what is today Macedonia Alexan der the Great b 356 BCE d 323 BCE and his army of Greeks swept through the Mediterranean world They conquered land east across Asia Minor the Middle East and all the way to India To the south they defeated and ruled Egypt Alexander found ed cities along the way One of those was Alexandria on the northern coast of Egypt It sat at the mouth of the mighty Nile River Alexander died in 323 BCE without leaving a successor to his empire His four generals 9 Alexander the Great ordered a causeway to connect the island of Tyre with the mainland and sent his armies over it to con quer the city The causeway remains in place today
