The last Pharaoh of Egypt, Cleopatra. She is remembered as a temptress, femme fatale, and for looking exactly like Liz Taylor. None of that is accurate.
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She was actually Greek by ethnicity but culturally she was truly an Egyptian leader. She had herself portrayed as an incarnation of the goddess Isis, in the Egyptian art style and religious tradition. The Romans used her beauty as an excuse to explain how she had gained so much power as a woman. When it’s far more likely that it was her charm as a politician and diplomatic skills that helped her win people over. She was the first of her family line to learn and speak Egyptian, along with a dozen other languages.
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I will always love the story of her appearing before Julius Caesar. She was in the middle of a civil war with her brother and was exiled to Syria. When Caesar came to Egypt,she saw the chance to take back her thrown. But her brother would kill her if she returned. So, she had her servant wrap her in a carpet and deliver the carpet to Caesar. When the carpet unrolled, the Queen made her appeal. Cleopatra now had the might of Rome behind her and she did rule Egypt. History remembers her as the last of a 5,000 year tradition of Pharaohs. But I remember her as a woman brave enough to stand with some of the greatest men in history and still cast a shadow.
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She was actually Greek by ethnicity but culturally she was truly an Egyptian leader. She had herself portrayed as an incarnation of the goddess Isis, in the Egyptian art style and religious tradition. The Romans used her beauty as an excuse to explain how she had gained so much power as a woman. When it’s far more likely that it was her charm as a politician and diplomatic skills that helped her win people over. She was the first of her family line to learn and speak Egyptian, along with a dozen other languages.
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I will always love the story of her appearing before Julius Caesar. She was in the middle of a civil war with her brother and was exiled to Syria. When Caesar came to Egypt,she saw the chance to take back her thrown. But her brother would kill her if she returned. So, she had her servant wrap her in a carpet and deliver the carpet to Caesar. When the carpet unrolled, the Queen made her appeal. Cleopatra now had the might of Rome behind her and she did rule Egypt. History remembers her as the last of a 5,000 year tradition of Pharaohs. But I remember her as a woman brave enough to stand with some of the greatest men in history and still cast a shadow.
