1543) Cleopatra VII

Cleopatra VII Philopator (70/69 BC – 30 BC). Queen of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt from 51 to 30 BC, and its last active ruler. A member of the Ptolemaic dynasty, she was a descendant of its founder Ptolemy I Soter, a Macedonian Greek general and companion of Alexander the Great. After the death of Cleopatra, Egypt became a province of the Roman Empire, marking the end of the last Hellenistic state in the Mediterranean and of the age that had lasted since the reign of Alexander (336–323 BC). Although her first language was Koine Greek, she was the only Ptolemaic ruler to learn and use the Egyptian language.

Cleopatra VII was born in early 69 BC to the ruling Ptolemaic pharaoh Ptolemy XII and an uncertain mother, presumably Ptolemy XII's wife Cleopatra VI Tryphaena, the mother of Cleopatra's older sister, Berenice IV Epiphaneia. Cleopatra Tryphaena disappears from official records a few months after the birth of Cleopatra in 69 BC. Cleopatra's childhood tutor was Philostratos, from whom she learned the Greek arts of oration and philosophy. During her youth Cleopatra presumably studied at the Musaeum, including the Library of Alexandria.

By 29 August 51 BC, official documents started listing Cleopatra as the sole ruler, evidence that she had rejected her brother Ptolemy XIII as a co-ruler. She had probably married him, but there is no record of this. The Ptolemaic practice of sibling marriage was introduced by Ptolemy II and his sister Arsinoe II. A long-held royal Egyptian practice, it was loathed by contemporary Greeks. By the reign of Cleopatra, however, it was considered a normal arrangement for Ptolemaic rulers.

 

Below, posthumous painted portrait of Cleopatra VII of Egypt, from Herculaneum (see here for more details).

 

 

Below, Venus and Cupid from the House of Marcus Fabius Rufus at Pompeii, most likely a depiction of Cleopatra VII (see here for more details).

 

 

Below, fresco of a woman in profile, possibly Cleopatra VII of Ptolemaic Egypt, from the House of the Orchard at Pompeii (see here for more details).