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I'm Alistair Budge and today we are going to be talking about the famous Egyptian queen, Cleopatra VII.
She died over 2000 years ago, and didn't even live long enough to see her 40th birthday, but she led a simply fascinating life and left a legacy that continues to intrigue and fascinate to this very day.
So let's not waste a minute and talk about Cleopatra.
For practically all of human history, and in many countries to this very day, women have had it pretty tough, treated as second -class citizens compared to their male counterparts.
Limited access to education, limited employment opportunities, forced to marry someone they might despise, faced with the possibility of dying during childbirth, and treated as inferior to men.
And even for women throughout history who have clearly been far more talented and intelligent than the men around them, they are often reduced to their femininity, their womanhood, portrayed as a temptress to innocent and honourable men.
We spoke about this in a mini -series last year on Anne Boleyn, Catherine the Great of Russia and Elizabeth I of England.
But there is perhaps no greater example of an immensely talented woman who history is reduced to her sexuality than the subject of today's episode, Cleopatra VII of Egypt.
In much of popular culture, she is thought of as a supporting actor to the goings -on of ancient Rome, and as a temptress that seduced powerful men with nothing more than her beauty.
Or, to quote the French philosopher and mathematician Blis Pascal, had Cleopatra's nose been shorter, the whole face of the world would have been changed.
As we'll see, there is much more to her than her physical appearance.
There's also much more to her than her relationship with Rome.
But we cannot tell the story of Cleopatra without also understanding a bit of what was going on in ancient Rome, and in the Mediterranean at the time of her rule.
In fact, we need to go back a few hundred years to get a proper understanding.
When Alexander the Great conquered Egypt in 332 BC, he established a city in his name, Alexandria.
After his death, his empire was divided among his generals, and one of his favourite generals, Ptolemy I, was given Egypt.
Ptolemy became an Egyptian pharaoh, and the Ptolemaic dynasty lasted for almost 300 years.
During this period, its capital, Alexandria, became a great centre for science, technology, philosophy and mathematics.
It was one of, if not the, world's centre of science and culture at the time.
And this was the environment in which Cleopatra was born, in early 69 or late 70 BC.
She would have received the best education in the world, learning mathematics, philosophy and reasoning, and by all accounts she was a remarkable young woman.
She was also a talented linguist.
Her mother tongue would have been Greek, but she spoke 10 languages, including the Egyptian language.
Now, you might think, of course she would speak Egyptian, she was the queen of Egypt.
But this wasn't actually that obvious.
The Ptolemaic kings that came before her refused to learn Egyptian, and ruled the country as a Greek state, essentially, having a lot of fun and partying, but not really engaging at all with the people of Egypt.
Cleopatra would be different, as we'll see in a minute.
Anyway, back to our story.
Cleopatra's early life, indeed her entire life, was characterised by political instability, infighting and disputes going on on the other side of the Mediterranean, in Rome.
This episode would literally go on for days if we were to go into all of them in detail, so you will forgive me for skipping over some of the details to focus more on Cleopatra herself.
Her father died when she was around 11 years old, and in his will he specified that Cleopatra and her brother Ptolemy XIII should get married and be joint rulers.
This might sound unusual to us, but it was the Ptolemaic tradition for siblings to marry and have children, so that the royal blood was pure.
The problem was, in Cleopatra's case, that she didn't really get on with her brother, plus she was far more talented than he was, and this sibling rivalry culminated in a full -scale civil war.
Shortly before this, there was also civil unrest on the other side of the Mediterranean.
Rome was split into two factions, that of Julius Caesar and that of Pompey.
After a decisive battle in Greece, the Battle of Phalassus, where Pompey's forces were defeated, Pompey was forced to flee to Egypt, where he thought he would be welcomed with open arms, as he had been an ally of Cleopatra and Ptolemy XIII's father, Ptolemy XII.
He wasn't, and shortly after his arrival, he was ambushed and killed on the orders of Ptolemy XIII, of Cleopatra's brother.
When Caesar arrived in Alexandria shortly after, Ptolemy presented him with the severed head of his rival, assuming that he would be pleased.
But he wasn't. Pompey might have been his rival, but Caesar didn't want a renegade Egyptian boy pharaoh taking matters into his own hands.
Now, I know that's a lot of detail, and quite a few Ptolemies to take in, but we are now at the exciting part.
It is autumn of 48 BC in Alexandria.
Caesar has arrived, the most powerful man in Rome, and he is in the royal palace, surrounded by forces loyal to Ptolemy XIII, Cleopatra's brother, who is plotting to get rid of his sister.
Cleopatra wasn't actually in the city at the time, but she knew that she needed to go in and talk to Caesar.
She couldn't very well knock on the door and request a formal meeting.
This would come to her brother's attention immediately.
Legend has it that she wrapped herself up in a carpet and was smuggled into the palace, where she found the then 52 -year -old Caesar.
She had heard that the Roman was not exactly impervious to female charms, or to put it more bluntly, that he was known to sleep with anyone he could, and she rightfully thought that he could be a useful ally at a dangerous time for the young queen.
After all, he was the most powerful man in Rome, perhaps even in the world at that time, and with his help she could get rid of her pesky little brother and secure her rule.
So in she came, reportedly wrapped up in a carpet or camouflaged in a laundry basket.
In any case, unannounced.
The 21 -year -old Egyptian queen presented herself to Caesar, and he was immediately drawn in by her charm.
But this wasn't, reportedly, merely that she was a beautiful woman.
It was because she was a fascinating person, a great conversationalist, supremely intelligent, and someone the Roman clearly felt an immediate connection with and attraction for.
We have no record of what Cleopatra felt for Caesar, but the two quickly became lovers and allies, with Caesar supporting her against her brother.
Caesar attempted to negotiate a settlement with Ptolemy XIII, allowing for Cleopatra and Ptolemy to rule jointly, but it was rejected.
Ptolemy raised an army and laid the palace to siege, with Caesar and Cleopatra inside it.
This turned out to be a bad idea.
It brought Cleopatra and Caesar yet closer together, and by the time Caesar's reinforcements arrived, they managed to overpower Ptolemy's forces, and Cleopatra's brother drowned in the Nile.
With her brother out of the picture, the Egyptian throne was Cleopatra's, and in 48 BC, when she was 21 years old, she became de facto sole ruler of Egypt.
In fact, Cleopatra did have another younger brother, who became co -ruler with his sister, as per the Ptolemaic tradition, but he only ruled in name, and when he died in mysterious circumstances, thought to have been poisoned by his sister, the throne became Cleopatra's and Cleopatra's alone.
And by all accounts, she was an excellent ruler.
She spent her days reading and responding to letters from officials.
She was attentive to the needs of her subjects.
She was a popular and effective queen.
Shortly after she became queen, she had a child, the father now widely believed to be Caesar, although he did not publicly acknowledge the boy.
For a few years, the going was good, but on the 15th of March 44 BC, something happened that really put a spanner in the works for Cleopatra.
It got in the way of her plans.
Caesar was assassinated, stabbed 23 times by his fellow Roman senators.
What followed, at least as far as Cleopatra is concerned, was the splitting of Rome into several factions.
First, Caesar's allies against his assassins, and then, when the assassins were defeated, the rivalry between Caesar's allies descended into full -out war.
On one side was Octavian, Caesar's grand -nephew and adopted son, who controlled much of the Western Roman Empire.
Octavian would later become known as Augustus, but we will call him Octavian for the rest of the episode, for the sake of ease.
And on the other side, initially Octavian's ally, but later his rival, was Mark Antony, Julius Caesar's trusted lieutenant who controlled the East.
This put Cleopatra in a difficult position.
Egypt was essentially a client state of Rome, so she had to tread carefully and play her cards right.
Mark Antony summoned Cleopatra to a meeting, which historians now believe was with the express intention of inheriting the alliance she had previously had with Julius Caesar, and perhaps more.
Like Caesar before him, Mark Antony was a powerful man who had had a series of lovers, and it seems probable that he wanted to add an Egyptian queen to his list of conquests.
After initially ignoring his requests, Cleopatra agreed to come, and she arrived in the summer of 41 BC.
The arrival has gone down in history, with Cleopatra arriving not in a warship, but a boat filled with purple flowers and perfumed sails.
And when she arrived, she refused to get off the boat, forcing the Roman general to come to her, not vice versa.
Sure enough, the pair did become lovers, but historians believe this to have been a carefully calculated move on Cleopatra's path.
Mark Antony was one of, if not the most powerful men in Rome, after Caesar's death, and he would be an enviable ally for the Egyptian queen.
Cleopatra at this time was not even 30 years old, but had shown herself to have a well -honed understanding of politics, and how to navigate the complexities of regional politics at the time.
And they were most certainly complex.
She knew that having Mark Antony as her ally and lover would help secure her position, but not only that, if he became a father to her children, the pair would have an inseparable connection.
They went on to have three children together, which Antony declared to be rulers of different Roman territories in the Eastern Mediterranean.
What's more, Antony divorced his wife, who just so happened to be Octavian, his main rival's sister.
And if that wasn't enough, he declared Cleopatra's son with Caesar to be Caesar's true heir, not Octavian.
Octavian had loathed Cleopatra before all this, considering her to have seduced his brother -in -law and torn him away from his duties as a father and a statesman.
But enough was enough.
There had been a propaganda war waged by Octavian, with his supporters putting out pamphlets portraying Cleopatra as an Eastern temptress and Mark Antony as a lost and weak general.
But this would develop into a military conflict that lasted almost two years.
Now, we could go into a lot of detail about this war, but we must skip to the end.
Octavian's proved victorious and followed Cleopatra and Mark Antony back to Egypt, to where they had fled.
With Octavian advancing towards Cleopatra, she barricaded herself inside her tomb and asked her servants to send a message to Mark Antony that she had committed suicide.
When Mark Antony received the message, he was distraught and fell on his sword in a bid to himself if it would have meant living in a world without Cleopatra.
But Cleopatra didn't kill herself, at least not at that point.
As Mark Antony lay dying, he was reportedly told that Cleopatra wasn't dead.
He requested to be brought to her, wishing to see her one last time and show her that he had died honourably.
Now it was up to Cleopatra to kill herself.
But before she could, she was detained by forces loyal to Octavian.
He had grand plans to bring her to Rome and parade her around, which would have been the ultimate embarrassment for the Egyptian queen.
But, as you may know, it did not end that way.
Legend has it that poisonous snakes, Egyptian asps were smuggled into where Cleopatra was being kept, and she pressed them against her breast, killing herself to avoid the humiliation that she knew was awaiting her.
If you've seen paintings of the death of Cleopatra, or even statues, most have her breasts showing, or her dress open, and snakes nearby.
Now, we don't know whether that's what really happened.
Plutarch suggests that she might have poisoned herself by putting poison on a needle, or something like that, and that it was not her breast but her arm.
However it happened, the great queen killed herself, dead at the age of 39.
In terms of her legacy, well, we know her story really only through the writings of Romans, who sought to portray her as a seductress and temptress, someone who had managed to seduce two powerful Roman men, and in so doing caused irreparable damage to the state of Rome.
We now know that the seducing was as much on Caesar and Mark Antony's part as Cleopatra's, and there is no evidence that she had any other lovers than these two, while both Caesar and Mark Antony have an extensive list of former lovers.
But, of course, it is Cleopatra who is remembered as this sexual figure, while the two Roman generals are not.
And reducing Cleopatra to the relationships she had with these prominent Romans is to do her a deep injustice.
Her seduction was in her intelligence.
She was clearly a captivating person to be around, able not just to hold her own, but to survive and thrive in a deeply unstable world.
She was not Egyptian by blood, but there is little doubt that she was the greatest queen in Egyptian history, and some might even say the greatest queen of all time.
Okay then, that is it for today's episode on Cleopatra, a fascinating character and clearly an amazing woman.
We could have gone on for hours talking about her life and the world she found herself in, but there was so much to cover, even in a mere 39 years, that I hope you will forgive me for skipping over some of the details.
As always, I would love to know what you thought about this episode.
Do you think that Cleopatra was the greatest queen of all time?
If not, who should claim that title?
And if we haven't yet made an episode about her, let me know immediately and we will get onto that.
The place for that is our community forum, which is at community .leanardoenglish .com, or of course you can email me directly, and I will make sure we get work on that episode.
You've been listening to English Learning for Curious Minds by Leonardo English.
I'm Alastair Bunch, you stay safe, and I'll catch you in the next episode.
