The cover of this book is kind of brilliant. Cleopatra's face is turned away from the viewer as if to suggest that we are not able or allowed to see who she really is. It is almost reminiscent of that old optical illusion often titled "Young Lady or Old Hag." It makes you want to open the book and start reading because feel like you want to get to be the person who gets to know this enigmatic woman, this legend, this queen of Egypt.
"Cleopatra" is wonderfully written. Schiff promises from the outset to bear in mind the motivations and track records of all of the various historians she will quote in this biography. Every perspective is just that, one perspective, and Schiff bears that in mind as she attempts to achieve some objectivity. Schiff draws mostly from 2 ancient historians, Plutarch and Cassius Dio, neither of whom were Cleopatra's contemporaries. Plutarch was writing about the Egyptian queen one hundred years after her death, Dio two hundred. The former despised overt displays of emotion and the latter was a sucker for stories of schemes and plots. Schiff attempts to glean what truth she can from these (and other) clearly biased accounts.
Before any story can be told it must first be set in context. Alexander the Great had been dead 300 years when Cleopatra was born, but his legend loomed over everything everyone did (as Hercules' did centuries before). Egypt was ruled by the Ptolemy family which claimed to descend straight from Alexander's blood line which means that Cleopatra was Macedonian Greek. No Nefertiti was she, being about as ethnically Egyptian as Elizabeth Taylor. As in most stories of the ancient world, the Mediterranean Sea was the perfect stage, It allowed enough distance to allow cultures and peoples to evolve in radically different ways, but not so much distance that they could avoid one another. Conflict was likely and the militaristic Romans had been busy doing everything they could to ensure that conflict was, in fact, inevitable. Cleopatra was born during the decades dominated by bloody Roman Civil Wars.
Cleopatra became Queen of Egypt in March of the year 51 BC at the age of 18. She was crowned co-ruler with her 10 year old brother. By the year 48, she was in exile and seeking to raise an army to reclaim her throne. Having grown up in Alexandria, a thriving Metropolis and cultural epicenter of the Mediterranean, she was highly educated and was the only Ptolemaic ruler to actually learn the Egyptian language of her 7 million subjects. All of her predecessors spoke only Greek. In fact, Cleopatra was fluent in 9 native languages, which gave her a distinct advantage in her efforts to raise, and then command her armies.
The knowledge collected in Alexandria is shocking, especially when you have a preconception of the ancient world as being a dark and ignorant place. The Library of Alexandria (which was literally in Cleopatra's back yard) was one of the Seven Wonders of the world, the nearby Lighthouse was another. Alexandrian tutors were renowned throughout the Mediterranean. Alexandrian scholars knew the sun was the center of the solar system, they knew how large our globe was (and that the Earth was a globe), they were fluent in advanced geometry, and they were aware that the moon caused the tides. By the time of her reign, Cleopatra and Julius Caesar could sail the Nile and view architecture that was almost 3,000 years old. The Great Pyramids' construction (another Wonder of the World) was as far removed from her time as she is now from yours. The Egyptians had been recording history in writing for two millennia.
In October of 48, Julius Caesar entered Alexandria furious that Cleopatra's brother had killed Caesar's chief rival. Only Roman generals were allowed to kill Roman generals after all. Cleopatra (in exile) snuck into Caesar's rooms and presented herself to the newly undisputed emperor of Rome. She convinced him to give up his ideas of claiming Egypt as a Roman state and he instead helped his new mistress reclaim her title as Pharaoh from her brother. Nine months later, she gave birth to Caesar's child.
In your arguments with people over the ridiculous Christian obsession with proper gender roles, you are often confronted with the notion that Christianity was actually revolutionary for progressing women's roles. This book helped you put a nail in the coffin of that particularly bullshit notion. Cleopatra died only 30 years before Jesus was born, her story colored the world he and his followers lived in. Jesus actually lived in Egypt as a young boy. Egyptian daughters inherited equally to sons, and they could hold property. Wifely submission was not a thing along the Nile. Women had the right to divorce and hold their property after divorce. They owned businesses and hired employees. If male dominated cultures were the "natural order of things," as Schiff infuriatingly states, then why did one of the oldest civilizations on Earth not adhere to that "natural order?" Doesn't it stand to reason that the arbitrary gender roles that arose in cultures far younger than Egypt, ones that insisted wives submit to husbands and stay quiet, ones that refused to recognize female inheritance and that devalued daughters as objects to be bartered, are actually cultures more representative an "unnatural order?"
Regardless of proper gender roles, either ancient or modern, it is clear that Cleopatra is viewed unfairly in the Roman world during her own lifetime specifically because of her sex. The brutal Civil War sparked by Caesar's ascension to power finally came to an end on Egyptian ground when Cleopatra's brother beheaded Caesar's chief rival, Pompey. Caesar eventually returned to Rome and Cleopatra soon followed. She lived in Caesar's villa until his infamous assassination on the Ides of March in 44 BC. Part of what made her so intriguing to the Romans was that she had entered into this sexual relationship with Caesar of her own accord, as an equal. In a culture more used to treating women like commodities, a queen who would instigate a sexual relationship with an emperor was a unique and bewitching concept. However, precisely because of her sex, she was viewed (and is even today) in a different light. What is seen in Caesar as commendable and enviable ambition is seen in Cleopatra as devious and dangerous manipulation. Her decision to withdraw a wrecked navy in the new Civil War between Caesar loyalists and his assassins would been seen as tactically sound in a male general, but in Cleopatra it is seen as womanly cowardice. Often the only difference between what are seen as schemes rather than strategies is in the count of X chromosomes.
Cleopatra proved to be the perfect social chameleon, infinitely pragmatic. She also had the wealth to accomplish whatever needed to be done to protect her people and extend her own rule. At Tarsus (the future birthplace of the apostle Paul) she meets Mark Antony (who is fighting to claim Caesar's place as the leader of Rome) with one of the greatest banquets in history. After establishing herself as the wealthiest individual in the known world and dazzling her guests with lavish gifts (bejeweled dining sets, golden couches, lush palanquins and the slaves to carry them!), and after convincing her audiences that she might just be the goddess Isis in human form, after inspiring awe and wonder in the crowds of peasants and nobles alike, she was able to effortlessly slip into a jovial and rustic charm in order to put Mark Antony at ease. Moments after her presentation as the paragon of gentility and regal composure, she transformed herself into a thigh-slapping buddy for the old soldier. Anything to maintain her position and help her people. Her son's status, as Caesar's offspring and claimant to the Roman throne, ensured that she was snared in yet another Roman Civil War, but Cleopatra was determined to set the agenda and soon she and Mark Antony were engaged in a passionate relationship.
It's hard to overstate the effect Cleopatra had on the region. Her relationship with Antony directly resulted in the crown being placed on Herod's head (yes, that Herod). His small kingdom was the only independent area in the vast territory ruled by the queen of Egypt. Her domain extended from the Eastern borders of (what we now call) Libya to the Upper Nile, to the shores of the Red Sea, the Sinai peninsula, across almost all of Palestine and Phoenicia, and all the way up into Turkey! Her children were called King of Kings and Queen of Kings before a young carpenter from Galilee claimed that title too (Jesus' childhood would have been rich with stories of Cleopatra). Octavian (Caesar Augusts) effectively suspended the Roman Senate in order to declare war on her, the only time Rome declared war on one single person. He used this war to rid himself of Mark Antony, his chief rival for power. Cleopatra was the last of the Ptolemaic rulers of Egypt and her death marked the final moment of the 400 year old Roman Republic. From that day forth, Rome was an undisputed monarchy.
After his triumph over Antony and Cleopatra, Octavian declared Egypt a Roman state and began siphoning off all of the riches that land had to offer. In Octavian's custody in Alexandria, Cleopatra committed suicide only eight days after Antony. Or did she? Schiff makes a convincing case that Octavian himself actually killed her. He would have planted the seeds of suicide story (suggesting she let herself be bitten by an asp) in order to wash his hands of the murder, but her death made his future much more simple. In either case, being an expert in the efficacy of most poisons and their uses, it is highly unlikely that Cleopatra died from any snake bite.
She was an extraordinary character. By sheer force of will and audacity, she was able to rise from exile and obscurity to become a legend. She was able to enrich her huge and diverse empire, to protect her people for as long as she could from seemingly unstoppable forces. Her hands were certainly covered in blood from her rise to power and her efforts to keep it, but that has never kept you from thinking of men as great rulers. Cleopatra was, for lack of a better term, a baddass. And she achieved that title in a world dominated by Romans who prided themselves on being the baddest of baddasses. She outlived all but one of them, and he immediately named himself a god once he had disposed of her.
In the closing paragraph of this outstanding biography, Schiff notes that "In her adult life, Cleopatra would have met few people she considered her equal." After learning more about this unforgettable woman, you aren't sure that anyone in any lifetime has have ever met her equal.
On to the next book!
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