This is a totally gripping, yet at times shocking and disturbing book about the life and times of the seven Cleopatras of Ptolemaic Egypt.
It is meticulously written and researched by Lloyd Llewellen-Jones and is
divided into three parts, with eighteen chapters and a prologue and epilogue. Included is a timeline, maps, a family tree for the Seleucids and Ptolemies /Cleopatras, a note about their naming and a list of illustrations and useful sources, two sections of black and white photos and an index.
Most people would think of Cleopatra (Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator) as the Cleopatra – the legendary one, perpetuated in film, art, poetry, music and drama (most famously perhaps in Shakespeare’s play and the film with Elizabeth Taylor. She was the last of her line, and most of us have never been aware of the previous Cleopatras.
A woman more myth than history, immortalized in poetry, drama, music, art, and film. She entranced Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, two of the greatest Romans of their time, and legend has it that she died with a cobra at her breast
We learn that the Cleopatras were descended from Ptolemy, the Greek speaking general who subjugated Egypt with Alexander the Great.
The name Cleopatra, of Greek sources, was joined to the Ptolemies in 193 BC. By then however, Egypt was already in decline as a major power and Rome was already eclipsing the boundaries and politics of what remained of Alexander the Great’s empire. He also describes the bigoted Graeco-Macedonian takeover of Egypt and describes the so-called Great Revolt of around 199 BC. Setting southern Egypt alight, it was quelled by Alexandria only after a great display of compulsion.
The Cleopatras were very closely related, as intimate relatives (mother, daughters, nieces, half-sisters) and intermarried with their male counterparts (brothers, uncles etc). Their lives are analysed – each presented themselves as goddess-queens, with enormous power, dominating their sons or husbands, and used massive displays of massive wealth, lavish parades and spectacles and esoteric religious ceremonies.
They coped with massive political turmoil and had to understand and cope with adjusting to life at court, eruptions of mob violence, dealing with their husbands, and behind the scenes court machinations. They led armies into battle as Pharaoh, commanded naval fleets and ruthlessly murdered adversaries, even though some were siblings or other relatives.
Also conjectured is what childhood could have possibly been like for a Ptolemaic princess and how they were expected to be a ‘brood mare’ producing children. Power and political eminence hinged on keeping the family lineage going to popularize the god-like singularity of the Ptolemies. The Queens were bolstered by religion – the court and the clergy were interconnected. Llewellyn-Jones describes the art and hieroglyphs unearthed in various temples.
The name, of Greek origin, was introduced into the ruling lineage of the Ptolemies with the marriage of Ptolemy V in 193 BC to a distant cousin, the ‘Syrian’ Cleopatra, a Seleucid princess. By this date, Ptolemaic Egypt was already past its heyday as a Mediterranean power. Rome was casting an ever-lengthening shadow over the states that had succeeded Alexander the Great’s empire in Greece, Asia and Egypt. The background to the queenship of the Cleopatras was one of Ptolemaic decline.
The Cleopatras is a beguiling look at the lives of seven exceptional women , placing them back among history’s rulers and the enticing and fateful life and legend of Egypt’s last Queen .
https://www.hachette.com.au/lloyd-llewellyn-jones/the-cleopatras
Publisher: Headline Publishing Group ISBN: 9781472295163 Number of pages: 384 Weight: 640 g Dimensions: 240 x 164 x 42 mmxx
