In
the year 69 B.C., a baby girl was born that would enjoy a lifetime of
royalty
and power, but would also experience a significant amount of anguish
and
hardship. Born into the lavish courts of
Egypt,
Cleopatra and her three siblings had a very
privileged and extravagant childhood. At
the age of 18, Cleopatra became the ruler of Egypt
when her father, Ptolemy XII, died and left the
throne in her hands. Cleopatra,
descended from a line of kings and quite possibly born illegitimate,
became a
queen who demanded a great deal of respect from her subjects. She gave birth to four children by two
different fathers who were, as far as we know, the only real lovers in
her
life. Even her death shows that she had
a strong will: she would not allow herself to be demoted and ridiculed
in the
streets of Rome. Queen Cleopatra
was a powerful woman who became a great ruler in a previously
male-dominated
society, and still managed to bear the responsibilites of motherhood.
The Real Cleopatra
Although
Cleopatra has often been portrayed as a beautiful Egyptian goddess-like
figure,
her actual appearance is not known. Some
scholars believe she looked distinctly Greek with blonde hair, pale
skin, and that
she was not strikingly beautiful. Also,
though she became extremely educated and knew several languages,
including the
native Egyptian tongue, she was somewhat disconnected from the true Egypt
because of her location in Alexandria. This was
more like a Greek city than an Egyptian one because its location was so
far up
in Lower Egypt, which is actually in the
northern portion of the
country.
Cleopatra's First Ties to Rome
When
Cleopatra first ascended the throne in 51 B.C.,
there was a great deal of controversy over whether the ruler of the
state should
actually be Cleopatra or her brother and husband, Ptolemy XIII (Nardo,
23). In order to have a legitimate heir to
the
throne, both parents had to be descended from the gods.
Members of the royal family were the only
ones considered divine and so they were married. It
was common for royal Egyptian siblings to
hate each other because of competition for the throne and jealousy of
the one
with the crown. Her brother was very
young, but his advisors would not stand to see Cleopatra as the queen
and so
publicly discredited her by blaming unavoidable crises on her, such as
the Nile not rising for two years, which
ultimately sent her into exile (Nardo
23-24).
Once
she was out of exile in 48 B.C., Cleopatra truly
began her reign as the Queen of Egypt.
This was when she formed her close ties with Julius Caesar. Her affair with Caesar raised her status
throughout the Roman world, and also generated her son, Caesarion,
meaning “Little
Caesar.” At his first meeting with her,
where she made the grand entrance by arriving in his palace wrapped in
a
carpet, Caesar was instantly seduced by Cleopatra (Chauveau 24). Although it has not been proven that
Cleopatra’s son was Caesar’s as well, the boy had the same “falling
sickness,” the
term that was used for epilepsy, as Julius Caesar, which is a
hereditary condition
and evidence that seems to contradict those claiming that Caesarion was
not
Caesar’s son (Desmond 38-43). Also, it
would have been in the interest of Caesar to have an heir to the throne
who was
of mixed blood because he then would be able to annex Egypt
to the Roman Empire (Bradford
74).
In Egypt,
the rulers were synonymous with the gods, so the
pharaohs had some heavenly counterpart by whose name they were called. As Cleopatra was known as Isis,
Caesar had to be accepted as the reincarnation of Amon for their son
to be a legitimate heir to the throne (Bradford
79-80). This also made their
marriage legitimate because Caesar was not a foreigner to Egypt
any longer; he was a divine being. In Egypt,
marriage between an Egyptian and a foreigner was
not accepted, but this no longer posed a problem for the two rulers
(Desmond
23-25).
A New Love
While
Caesar was accepted as a pharaoh in Egypt,
Cleopatra had yet to be secured as the queen in Rome,
especially since Caesar was already married. Unfortunately,
before she could be designated
as a ruler of the Roman Empire, Caesar was
brutally
murdered. This also meant that her son
could no longer be the legitimate heir to the Roman throne. For two years after Caesar’s death, Cleopatra
ruled Egypt
alone, without Ptolemy XIII or Julius Caesar, while
staying out of the civil war raging in the Roman Empire
(Nardo 35-37).
Once Antony was the
clear victor, she gladly fulfilled his
requests of supplies from her country (Nardo 39). The
two soon became lovers, which quite
possibly could also have been an economically and politically motivated
relationship, because they both could gain from the other.
Cleopatra wanted protection for her country
while Antony sought
materials produced by Egypt.
Whatever the reason for the
relationship between Antony
and Cleopatra, it produced three more children, a
set of twins, Alexander Helios and Cleopatra Selene, and a boy named
Ptolemy
Philadelphus. While Cleopatra was
pregnant with the twins, Antony
was forced to return to Greece
to settle an incident, and while he was there,
Cleopatra gave birth (Desmond 65-67).
Soon after the twins were born, Antony
married Octavian Caesar’s sister, Octavia, which was
originally suggested by Octavian himself so as to secure the link
between the
triumvirs (Desmond 67). The triumvirate
was the union of Antony,
Octavian Caesar, and Lepidus who jointly ruled the Roman
Empire. Antony ended
up remaining in Greece with his new wife and away from Cleopatra for
about
three and a half years. Cleopatra was
left alone to raise their children. She
was enraged at Antony for
leaving her, and so refused to be near their
children because they reminded Cleopatra of her absent husband. She became dependent on her son, Caesarion,
by turning to him for comfort, which he could not provide.
Her children eventually became estranged
without a real mother figure.
Cleopatra Alone
Meanwhile,
Cleopatra was left to rule her country
alone, where she earned her status as a great ruler in the ancient
world. She expanded agriculture by
increasing the
food quantities which lowered overall food prices and eliminated the
food
shortage; paid respect to Egyptian tradition, which her predecessors
had failed
to do, by acting as the incarnation of Isis; became very educated from
her
pleasure in reading and then in writing; and unlike her ancestors, she
handled
the state’s money well and did not run the country into debt while
still living
extravagantly (Nardo 49-56). Her last
contribution
was an extremely important part of her success as a ruler, because
nearly every
ruler before her had completely depleted Egypt’s
treasury.
It is not known how she managed to do this, but it is believed
that a
portion of the money came from selling some of the surplus food in the
granaries, and possibly leasing a part of the land where significant
medicines
were found (Nardo 56). Though she was a
woman, Cleopatra developed her country better than any of the men
before her,
which made her a great and even legendary ruler.
The Downfall
In
37 B.C., Cleopatra and Antony
were reunited once again, which seemed to show that
he was turning his back on Rome
since he was choosing his Egyptian lover over his Roman wife. However, this may not be the case because Antony
had secured his ties with Octavian Caesar by granting
him the use of several ships. By
renewing ties with Cleopatra, he could gain politically by having Egypt
on his side in the new war against Parthia
(Chauveau 50-51).
Once the two lovers were together again, Antony
granted Cleopatra the land that she wanted, and in
return she provided him with the resources he needed for the war (Bradford
170). Whatever his reasons at
the time, in the following years he began cutting his ties with
Octavian. At one point he sent Octavia
back to Rome, but kept
Cleopatra at his side in Syria,
which helped to destroy his reputation in Rome
(Nardo 60-63).
To the Romans, this was offensive because Antony
was choosing a foreign lover over his Roman
wife. Cleopatra was seen as a considerable
threat to the Roman Empire, because it appeared
to be her fault that the
triumvirate was demolished. Just the
idea of the exotic state of Alexandria
seemed like a threat because it was so unlike anything in Roman culture.
During this reconciliation, Antony
and Cleopatra’s third child was born, whom she named
Ptolemy Philadelphus. At the time of the
child’s birth, Antony was
not actually with Cleopatra; he was being
defeated by the Parthian army, but he soon returned home to focus his
attention
on Octavian and how he could possibly be defeated (Desmond 74-83). Once they had prepared for war against
Octavian, which took a great deal of planning in itself, and had
decided to
attack on the water, Antony and Cleopatra, each commanding several
ships, set
out to battle (Nardo 69-77). When
Cleopatra saw that her army was being defeated, she ordered her ships
to flee. In a famous episode, Antony’s
fleet followed her lead, which ultimately led Octavian
Caesar to victory (Nardo 77-78). Cleopatra
still felt that Octavian could be defeated, but she soon realized that
she
could not build an army because no one believed that Egypt
would prevail if given another chance.
By this time Cleopatra’s long-term
lover had become a middle-aged alcoholic, and their relationship had
grown very
strained. It became clear to both of
them that they would soon face Rome’s
taking over Egypt,
but Cleopatra at least wanted to assure that
Caesarion would inherit the Egyptian throne.
Cleopatra publicly declared her two oldest sons, Caesarion, 18,
and
Alexander Helios, 16, to be grown men though this only provoked
Octavian to be
rid of both of them so that neither could take the Egyptian throne (Bradford
250). They were both murdered,
but not until after the famous deaths of both Cleopatra and Antony. The other
two children were to be ridiculed on the streets of Rome
in place of their mother, and then raised by Octavia,
Octavian Caesar’s sister and Antony’s
Roman wife.
Cleopatra
had heard that Antony was
blaming her for his failures, so she retreated
to her tomb and sent word to him that she had killed herself. Being completely grief stricken with this
knowledge, Antony put his
sword into his body, but without
successfully committing suicide (Bradford
257-258). From here he was brought to
Cleopatra, where the two supposedly had a tragic and heartbreaking
final
reunion. Once Antony
was finally dead and Cleopatra was about to kill
herself, Caesar invaded her tomb and restrained her so that she could
not join Antony in death. She
would be Caesar’s conquered prisoner who would walk the streets of Rome
as a whore in his triumph (Nardo 85). Once
Cleopatra learned of Octavian’s
intentions, she was determined to die before she could be made a
mockery. She had a man bring a basket of
figs
concealing an extremely poisonous snake to her and her two servants,
and she
immediately attached the serpent to her breast and then to her arm,
which
killed her, and then her servants, abruptly (Bradford
269-270).
Cleopatra
was a multi-talented woman who ruled her country with distinction. She advanced Egypt far beyond what it had been prior
to her reign. In her time, Egypt flourished with luxurious assets
which made it a
desirable place for her Roman counterparts, those being Julius Caesar
and Mark
Antony. Politically astute, yet with a
passionate heart, she succeeded in turning her business partners into
lovers. Their stories, though a bit
romanticized, are
basically common knowledge in our world today.
Cleopatra lived a rich life with a great deal of love, through
her
lovers and her children. Seen as Isis
by her subjects, she had the elevated status as the reincarnation of a
goddess, which reveals how much her people honored her. Cleopatra
was strong in mind and heart, and
had pride that even death could not conquer.
