So
Cleopatra pretty straightforward story
Shakespeare tells us that she's the gorgeous queen of Egypt and master of the art of seduction who banged her way across Rome to get
Power ultimately ruining her own Empire before committing Cobra assisted suicide couldn't be easier, right?
Wrong for starters never trust a leading question
But secondly and actually on topic
Cleopatra's real story is rather less uniformly disparaging and far more interesting history's pervasive problem with Egypt's final Pharaoh
is that she usually plays a side character in Roman history rather than ever being the protagonist in her own right and her story usually
Gets smeared in the shuffle because of it
It also didn't help that the only historical sources that we have on the matter are from Romans
Hence, the Rome centrism and the casting of her character as a seductress with a habit of ruining
Otherwise perfectly blameless great men, but such is life. So to get at the woman behind the myth. Let's do some history
Cleopatra's story actually starts 300 years earlier. When a Greek kid named Alexander decided that he wanted to own the entire planet
so he marched eastward beat the Persians and conquered everything in sight when he died 20 minutes later without a clear line of succession his
Generals scrambled to claim their corner of the fragmenting Macedonian Empire the general Ptolemy got his hands on Egypt and became King Ptolemy
kick-starting a dynasty that I can only describe as deeply
unpleasant to trace and speaking of click the video on the top
Right, if you want to watch me lose my freaking mind attempting to document the chronology of that lineage
But unsettling family politics aside
the Ptolemaic dynasty ruled during the so-called
Hellenistic era where Alexander successors spread hellenic that is to say Greek culture out to Syria
Mesopotamia and Egypt, although our story takes place along the Nile the ancestry of the Ptolemaic rulers ends the culture they promoted were
Unmistakably Greek fast forward three centuries and we have Cleopatra the seventh and her younger brother Ptolemy
Xiii both lived in the beautiful city of Alexandria the first century BC --hz knowledge capital of the entire
Mediterranean world between the superbly stocked library the abundance of
mathematicians poets scientists philosophers and rhetoric and the fact that she was a princess the young
Cleopatra had the best education possible in the entire greek world-- and unlike a lot of her party crazed ancestors
She actually put in the effort. She would have been raised on Homer Herodotus Plato Aristotle
All the classical works we know and a lot of the ones that we've lost in the meantime after
Memorization the focus shifted to composition making arguments telling stories and varied ways. Not just knowing but thinking and ultimately
Speaking and that's the crucial point during her life
Cleopatra wasn't described as spellbinding li gorgeous. But rather she was captivating. She was known to be the ultimate
Conversationalist and that's how she won people over none of her ancestors before her were
exceptionally intelligent and none of them bothered to even learn how to speak Egyptian but
Cleopatra could charmingly convince anyone of anything in one of ten different languages. Bottom line is the lady was smart
Okay
Because I feel like that point is all too often ignored in favor of how supposedly hot she was
So anyway when Cleopatra's father Ptolemy the 12th died the throne passed to her
Prepubescent brother Ptolemy the thirteenth and she served as his Co monarch interfamilial
Scheming was no stranger to the ptolemies and after a couple years of power jockeying between them Ptolemy made the political and military friends
He needed to force Cleopatra into exile
But at the same time another much much bigger civil war was afoot
Namely Caesar was busy staging a gigantic coup and chasing poppy across the entire Mediterranean
Now Pompey was close with the Ptolemy kids on account of business with their father and Cleopatra's
Hope was that she could promise Egypt's armies in his fight against Caesar if he kicked out her brother and made her queen
Solid plan, but the boy King Ptolemy decided that Caesar was a better bet so he had Pompey killed the second
He arrived in Alexandria. Caesar was deeply irritated at having his victory Yoink. So he angrily plopped himself down in the royal palace
Cleopatra saw an opening and
Got to work casually strolling into the palace wasn't an option on the count of her still being in exile
So she stealth her way in stories of her coming to Caesar
Neatly wrapped in a fine rug to get past the guards likely derived from the Queen being stuffed in a much less conspicuous
laundry bag instead
And by the way, when you do put your queen in the laundry
It's machine wash cold and then tumble dry lo there's not a tag. So it's hard to figure out sometimes
anyway, as Shakespeare would have it the romance begins from that very minute with Cleopatra's first major act being one of seduction now that wouldn't
Be a particularly high bar to clear given Caesar had an affair with every woman who so much has made eye contact with him
But the evidence points to any romance between the duo happening a little further down the line
Well, I don't doubt that Cleopatra eventually developed googly eyes for the sharpest cheekbones in the Mediterranean
She needed an ally much more than a boyfriend. That was just a bonus
Likewise Caesar probably realized after about two minutes of talking to her that she was a far more
Useful Ally ingrain provider than the young dumb and already on thin ice Ptolemy
They both had what the other wanted a good friend in a soon-to-be high place
But it wasn't as simple as high-fiving and conquering the world together
Ptolemy and his army blockaded Alexandria
and the new power couple was stuck in a besieged royal palace for six months Caesar put his neck out by betting on Cleopatra and
Sidenote that's not the kind of thing that Caesar of all people would do for just some crush
Cleopatra was clearly a valuable ally in Caesars eyes and not just a pretty face and figure however by the time that Caesars
Reinforcements arrived to break the siege of Alexandria and defeat Ptolemies armies the two had spent plenty of quality time together
They were lost in endless
Conversation she was pregnant they were tagging each other and memes
It was true love and by this point Caesar had conquered the entire Mediterranean
But instead of immediately going back to Rome to be dictator
He spent an extra year touring Egypt with Cleopatra when he returns to Rome
He publicly acknowledged Cleopatra's son caesarian as his child while caesarian wasn't in line to gain much in Rome
He would spend the next two decades preparing to become Pharaoh of Egypt
But our most pressing concern here is Cleopatra who now fully and finally
Became queen and she wasted no time in carefully tending to a kingdom that its rulers had largely ignored for centuries as queen
Cleopatra took on the role of Isis incarnate every bit of iconography be it arched dress
Coinage or ceremony all proclaimed the same message. Hi
My name is Cleopatra and I will be your goddess while Isis was essentially a universal deity in the Hellenistic era
Cleopatra had two main roles to fill the protector of justice and the mother of
well
Everything to that end actually being a mother was great PR for her because she really got to lean into her relationship
with the fertility of the Nile River agriculture was
Everything on the Nile and after her father went bankrupt by bribing Rome not to annex Egypt
She made effective use of a strong bureaucracy to make sure the economy ran smoothly when your entire
country lives and dies by the flooding of the river there really was no room to be less a fair about it and as it
Happened she had to deal with a string of droughts in the early years of her reign which she handled remarkably
Well, the Ptolemaic rulers were the most notorious party animals on earth and Cleopatra was no exception to that affinity for pageantry
She differed in that she utilized that revelry to make religious and political statements and she recognized that being a queen
Necessitated actually doing work whenever she wasn't hosting a royal function or ceremony
She was reading and writing letters addressing complaints from people up and down the Nile
She was also very attentive to the strife between Greeks and Egyptians. Most civil disturbances stemmed from that simple divide
So Cleopatra presented herself as a queen for both her fellow Greeks and for the population of Egypt. That was well, you know
Egyptian because no one in her family had bothered to do that before her she held corruption accountable provided for her people in equal measure
embraced the Egyptian aspects of her olace Pharaoh and again
actually spoke Egyptian every other Ptolemaic King used the throne as an excuse to party all day and all night, but not
Cleopatra and her 18 years as Queen her reign can be summarized with just a single sentiment
She cared meanwhile on the Roman side of the Mediterranean which is to say the entire rest of the Mediterranean by this point
Julius Caesar got
Super murdered and his adopted son and second-in-command were busy chasing down the assassins in Greece after that mess cleared up the young Caesar Octavian
Took command of the West while Marcus Antonius
Held on to the east and with it most of the land and sea that bordered Egypt as the conventional story goes
Antonius summoned Cleopatra to the Anatolian city of Tarsus and she delayed to build the suspense
But they fell in love the instant they met and it was immediately off to start a dynasty together again
No beyond the suspected eyelash fluttering ends the known facts that Antonius would bang any that even moves
Let's look at some practicalities first a decade earlier Rome suffered an embarrassing
Loss against Parthia Caesar was planning a campaign to avenge it but the dying business threw off his schedule a little bit
Antonius sitting pretty in the east and looking to inherit Caesars legacy was hell-bent on launching that campaign
But Rome was actively broke from fighting the assassins and Parthian campaigns were stupid expensive
No one else, but Cleopatra's
Egypt could fund that expedition on her end of things
Egypt could only stay independent by Rome's good will and what better will is there than love?
The story of the following decade is a quiet one for Cleopatra and almost solely revolves around her lavish and ruinous affair with Antonius
but here we need to consider the
exclusively Pro Octavian sources that we have for this as far as anyone riding during the Roman Empire is concerned Caesar and
Octavian were the winners and therefore the good guys
That's why with Caesar Cleopatra is portrayed as a mysterious and dramatic ally but for eventual loser Antonius
Cleopatra's said to have bewitched him into a life of enslaved debauchery and ruined everything. So after things got going
Yeah, they did love each other and she had three kids by him
But there's more actual strategy going on here than the ancient Roman tabloids would have you believe?
Cleopatra's solo story stays quiet and the Roman sources because there's no scandal and efficient government that said
Cleopatra had a string of good times in the following decade her Empire was prosperous secured by bloodline and enhanced by the small
But generous gift of Silesia, Assyria the LaVon Cyrene and Cyprus, you know
Nothing, too fancy just to return to the full extent of the old Ptolemaic empire
It's one of those feel-good gifts like scented candles. So basically in 37 BC Cleopatra was rolling in it
She had pretty much everything she wanted and when Antonius set off to conquer Parthia the next year
She would become empress of the entire East cities were already minting coins with both of their faces on them
He was Dionysus and she was Isis the pair of rulers was literally a match made in heaven
except for the fact that after that it wasn't like at all so
Unfortunately, the Parthian campaign was a total disaster and Antonius lost 1/3 of his army just on the retreats
whoops
Cleopatra was still doing really well
But it's after 36 that her beloved Antonius started to be more of a liability
Than a help at this point Octavian smelled blood so he cleverly gave Antonius an impossible choice
He sent his long-suffering sister and Antonius is actual Roman wife Octavia to the east along with 2,000 soldiers. The message was clear
Reject Cleopatra and accept Roman help or forfeit the army and your wife and keep your Egyptian harlot queen
Cleopatra couldn't lose her allies. So it was do or die hmm literally professionalism
So she laid on the affection to win Antonius over
I mean it worked but now they were in it together until the end and the writing was just starting to appear on the wall
to turn things around
Cleopatra did what her ancestors did best and through a celebration with the alliance of Antonius and
Cleopatra stronger and more interdependent than ever they decided to flex their might during citywide festivities
Cleopatra was declared queen of Kings with her son caesarian proclaims to be Caesars rightful heir in a very pointed jab at Octavian
Declared King of Kings and successor to the throne of Egypt as for her children with Antonius Alexander
Helios was crowned king of Armenia media and parthia the last - they didn't even own yet Cleopatra
Cellini was given Crete in Cyrene while Ptolemy Philadelphus got Vinicius Syria and Silesia
almost all of which belongs to Rome just a few years earlier as far as the happy couple was concerned the entire East belongs to
Their family and they had the pan Imperial iconography to match
Egypt and the Roman East were gone and in its place was the new Empire of Antonius and Cleopatra together
however
This was a colossal slap in the face
To Rome and Octavian had a very easy time
Convincing the people and his armies that Marcus Antonius had sacrificed his Roman identity to consorted this dangerous and dastardly
Egyptian queen I go into both the propaganda war and the actual war between Octavian and Antonius in this video here but for our purposes
Cleopatra's grand gesture at the so called donations of Alexandria became her complete undoing
After their defeat at Actium again up over here. Click it go watch it
It was game over the final months and moments of the Star couple have been
unsurprisingly romanticized to death literally, so there's no way to
Actually know what's up, but we can take some educated guesses after Actium
Antonius was a despondent mess and his soldiers were defecting hourly
but Cleopatra was still planning ways to escape and turn the tables while
Consoling Antonius at every turn that strength of character is nothing short of astounding even here in total defeat
She never quit in the end. There was no defeating Octavian, though
She threatens to burn the entirety of her treasure if he tried anything sneaky
He captured her and demanded that she be the main trophy in his victory parade and that was something that she would not do
With her lover already dead and her children by him promised to live with the infinitely accommodating
Octavia Cleopatra instead chose death it wouldn't have been by a snakebite though
Those really hurt and she had painless poisons for that kind of thing
The leaked will of Antonius the two were buried together in Alexandria where they've gone undiscovered to this day
So that is the roller coaster. That was Cleopatra's life
It's been twisted every which way to suit the needs of 2,000 years worth of writers
But under the slabs of romanticized gossip
Cleopatra was a woman who used her genius her wealth her power and to a certain extent her sexuality to accomplish her many goals
throughout her life
She planned carefully and worked hard because she cared and if only briefly in the grand scheme of things she achieved some insane stuff
She's arguably the most powerful woman in history and you could easily make the case that during her lifetime
She was the smartest most accomplished person on the planet, but of course
she also had boobs and did the sex sometimes which is clearly the takeaway historians playwrights and
storytellers should be focusing on that surely won't give anyone a dangerously reductive impression of one of history's most interesting people or diminish a
lifetime of world shaping accomplishments to to boyfriends and a snake
Now I'll link an article about this in the description
But as it happens Dominican archaeologist Kathleen Martinez has a really strong
Theory for the location of Cleopatra's tomb being under the temple of top Osiris magnet just west of Alexandria
She's been digging for several years. And at first the archaeological community thought she was crazy
But as she built her case
started discovering busts and coins with
Cleopatra's face on them at the site and most recently found a staircase that runs 30 meters beneath the temple the new consensus is she's
Founded it's just a matter of digging down and getting to it
The excavation is ongoing and with hope we'll have Cleopatra's actual tomb in just a few years. That's awesome