Cleopatra

by a bull

Cleopatra had three sisters. Her sister, also named Cleopatra, died rather young, and we don't have the cause of her death. Her second sister, Berenice, was executed by her father for usurping the throne, and Cleopatra's younger sister was executed by Marc Antony as a favor to Cleopatra.

We don't know what her hair color was. From her Macedonian heritage she could have had light hair, either a dark blond or auburn. However this is just a possibility, no more than a guess. We won't know for certain until her tomb is found and perhaps a bit of hair may be still attached to her mummy.

Marc Antony was the supreme Roman power in the east. Cleopatra quickly realized that she needed him to further her ambitions as Caesar, her former protector was dead. They made an alliance, with Antony giving her territories and titles and she giving him the financial support to further his military ambitions. Neither one of them really influenced the other to any great extent as they each had their own agendas. However Cleopatra was said to have had the greater influence on Antony by turning him away from Roman values with her excessive and luxurious lifestyle.

According to her coin portraits, yes, she had a large hooked nose. The realistic style busts that are thought to be of her, although they straiten out the hook to some extent, all show her with a very large nose.

We don't know anything about Cleopatra's life before she became queen. But it can be assumed that she was raised by the palace slaves who were under the supervision of her parents.

Cleopatra lived in the royal palace at Alexandria.

Empress of Egypt, but not in the strict sense of the word. Although she did gain territories from Marc Antony, she never kept them long enough to establish Egyptian rule. She also had an empty title "Queen of Kings", that in some sense of the word would make her an empress, but again, she had no kings under her rule.

Marc Antony and Cleopatra could never have divorced because they were never legally married. Most historians believe that their "marriage" was merely symbolic of their political alliance and announced to impress the Egyptian people. Antony was already married to a Roman wife at the time. Even if he did not already have a wife, a marriage between a Roman and a foreigner was illegal. So without a marriage, there could be no divorce.

Alexander and Cesarea

Octavian ordered a fabulous and regal funeral for Cleopatra.

Cleopatra rolled herself up in a carpet or mat to get into the palace because she would have been killed on sight if she entered Alexandria freely. She was at war with her brother and her brother would have liked nothing more than to be rid of her.

Cleopatra is dead. She has been dead for 2041 years.

Augustus or Octavian as he was known at the time, had the senate declare war on Cleopatra because, as they all believed, she had a degrading influence on Marc Antony and was, through him, trying to undermine Rome. However the reality of the situation was that Antony and Octavian were in a struggle for supreme power. Octavian could not declare war on Antony as he would be starting another civil war and the people were sick of Roman fighting Roman. His troops might not be loyal if this happened. So, by declaring war on Cleopatra, a foreigner, he could justify his reasons for war, even though he and most of Rome knew he would be fighting Antony.

Cleopatra, although she wanted to be queen, really had little choice. She was her father's heir along with her brother.

The impact that Cleopatra had on Egypt was that she helped build the canals and the pyramids and tombs. She helped Egypt out of debt and she also went to war for her country but she lost. So she fled back to Alexandria and her and Anthony committed suicide and Octavious took over Egypt after her death.

No, not exactly. There is a head of a child, quite chipped up, that some think may be Caesarion, but this is only a maybe. There is also another small head that may be Ptolemy Philadelphos. This head too is chipped. Then there is a small statuette of a child who might be Alexander Helios, but this too is a maybe.

Yes, in fact there were two wars. The first was the Alexandrian War which Caesar won. The second was the war between Antony and Cleopatra and Octavian, which Octavian won.

ya? Cleopatra ruled in the Ptolemaic or Hellenistic era of Egypt. She ruled in a Macedonian dynasty having nothing to do with the native Egyptian dynasties such as the Old, New or Middle Kingdoms.

Octavian did not kill Cleopatra. Cleopatra killed herself. She committed suicide.

Marc Antony was Cleopatra's Roman political ally. Cleopatra seduced him in order to get his protection for her kingdom, as Egypt was becoming surrounded by Roman territories and was in danger of being annexed by Rome. Their so-called love story has been hyped up out of proportion to its reality. Marc Anthony and Cleopatra were political allies, each using the other for their own purposes.

Cleopatra rose to power when Julius Caesar set her up on the throne.

Basically, the maids did everything they were told to do, afrerall, they were slaves. Her personal maids would dress her, take care of her clothing, fix her hair, apply her makeup, wash her back, give her a massage, and see to it that all her jewelry was cleaned and safe. They would travel with her both in Egypt and on foreign trips. Her domestic maids would take care of the cleaning and any other miscellaneous duties.

Cleopatra would have been eight years old in 61 BC.

Cleopatra lost the only war she was directly involved in, which was the war Rome declared against her. One battle, that of Actium, and it was all over for her.

A cartouche is a person's name written in hieroglyphics. It is a line, sometimes two, of hieroglyphics with a circle around it. Cleopatra's cartouche would simply be her name written in hieroglyphics.