EGYPTIAN INTERNATIONAL ART

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PAPYRUS

CLEOPATRA

Cleopatra is one of Egypt's most famous queens. She was proclaimed by Caesar as Queen of Egypt around 51 BC. Cleopatra was 17 or 18 when she became the queen of Egypt. She was far from beautiful, despite her glamorous image today. She is depicted on ancient coins with a long hooked nose and masculine features. In compliance with Egyptian tradition Cleopatra married her brother and co-ruler, Ptolemy XIII, who was about 12 at the time. But it was a marriage of convenience only, and Ptolemy was pharaoh in name only. For three years he remained in the background while Cleopatra ruled alone. Ptolemy's advisors - led by a eunuch named Pothinus - resented Cleopatra's independence and conspired against her. In 48 BC they stripped Cleopatra of her power and she was forced into exile in Syria. Her sister Arsinoe went with her. Cleopatra was an intellectual, an astute politician, and a powerful Queen of Egypt, but most people remember her primarily as a seductress. Cleopatra's prurient reputation was likely manufactured by the conquering Romans to discredit her name after her death. Cleopatra's whole life was devoted to Egypt. Even though she was probably Greek, not Egyptian, by birth, she was the first of her dynasty to learn the language of the country over which she ruled. Only seventeen years old when she came to the throne in 51 B.C., she watched the savage struggle then raging between Caesar and Pompey and hoped that Rome would destroy itself in the process.