Cleopatra

Made by: Lucía Custodio Martínez and Natalia Hernández Peña

Cleopatra

Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator (69 BC-30 BC) was the last ruler of the Ptolemaic dynasty of Ancient Egypt, although she was nominally survived as pharaoh by her son Caesarion. She was also a diplomat, naval commander, linguist, and medical treatise writer.

Her mother tongue was Koine Greek, although she was the first Ptolemaic sovereign to learn the Egyptian language.

She was a descendant of Ptolemy I Soter, founder of the dynasty, a Greco-Macedonian general of Alexander the Great.

In 58 BC she accompanied her father, Ptolemy XII, during his exile in Rome after a revolt in Egypt. When Ptolemy died in 51 BC, Cleopatra and her little brother, Ptolemy XII, acceded to the throne as co-regents, but the break between the two unleashed a civil war. As consul of the Roman Republic, Caesar tried to reconcile Ptolemy XII with his sister Cleopatra, but Potinus the Eunuch, chief adviser to the Egyptian monarch, believed that the terms proposed by the consul benefited his sister and therefore his forces besieged Caesar and Cleopatra in Alexandria.

The siege was lifted thanks to the arrival of Caesar's allies in early 47 BC, and Ptolemy XII died shortly after in the battle of the Nile. Arsínoe IV, Cleopatra's younger sister who had led the siege, went into exile in Ephesus and Caesar, already then elected dictator, declared Cleopatra and her little brother Ptolemy XIV co-rulers of Egypt. However, the Roman general began a sentimental relationship with the Egyptian queen from whom Caesarion, the future Ptolemy XV, was born. When Caesar was murdered in 44 BC. C., Cleopatra tried that her son was designated heir of her, but she could not due to the rise to power of Octavio, so, she ordered the murder of her brother Ptolemy XIV and raised her son Cesarion as co-ruler of Egypt.

After Cleopatra's death, Egypt became a province of the Roman Empire, marking the end of the Hellenistic period that had begun with the reign of Alexander (336-323 BC).

What did she do? Why is she so inspiring?

But actually, she was one of the first feminist and a very clever queen.

Cleopatra is usually paint as a prostitute or a harlot because she was beautiful, powerful and was married twice, once with Julio Cesar and the second one with Marco Antonio.

She wanted to have power and she used all her knowledges and her beauty to conquer Egypt and create wars in Rome.

She learned 9 different languages, all the languages known in that moment, to communicate by her own with everyone in that age.

She spended a lot of time at the library of Alejandria, taking the knowledge of thousand of thinkers and philosophers.

Thank YOU!