Egyptian queen. Queen Cleopatra VII of Egypt is a rare example of a ruling queen who raised armies and conducted wars, although she does not appear to have led her troops in person. She was the daughter of King Ptolemy XII, who when he died in 51 b.c. willed his throne to his son Ptolemy XIII (age ten) and his daughter Cleopatra (age seventeen), who then married in typical Ptolemaic fashion.
Ptolemy’s advisors feared the charming, intelligent Cleopatra and soon drove her from Egypt. She responded by raising an army against her brother. The Roman dictator Julius Caesar attempted to mediate between the two, but Ptolemy refused to cooperate, and Caesar’s and Cleopatra’s troops together defeated and killed Ptolemy. Cleopatra was then wed to her youngest brother (Ptolemy XIV) but soon became Caesar’s lover.
Cleopatra’s liaison with Caesar strengthened her precarious position as the last independent ruler of the Mediterranean world. This need to protect Egypt also led her, after Caesar’s death, to begin an affair with the Roman general Mark Antony, who had gained control of the eastern Roman provinces. Antony returned to Rome for a time, but his relationship with Cleopatra began afresh in 37 b.c. In 32, he went so far as to marry Cleopatra, who had borne him three children. To do so, Antony had to divorce his Roman wife Octavia, the sister of his arch-rival Octavian (the future Augustus Caesar).
Octavian naturally saw his sister’s divorce as a personal insult and seized the opportunity to declare war on both Antony and Cleopatra. It was a war over who would rule the Roman world, but Octavian’s skilful propaganda caused many to regard it as a struggle specifically against Cleopatra—an unnatural woman who exercised a thoroughly un-Roman dominance over Antony. The resources of Egypt made it possible for Cleopatra to provide a large squadron of ships to the struggle and also to provide the wages for much of Antony’s army. She did not command troops in battle but did act unusually for the age by insisting on being with the army and fleet during the campaign.
Octavian’s admiral succeeded in trapping Cleopatra’s and Antony’s combined fleet at Ac-tium on the west coast of Greece. They finally attempted a desperate breakout in September of 31 b.c. Cleopatra’s squadron sailed straight for the open Mediterranean, leaving Antony’s contingents to fight, and Antony soon broke loose and followed her. A legend perhaps begun by Octavian himself tells that Cleopatra lost her nerve and ran, while the besotted Antony abandoned his command to follow. This story is not plausible. Because all accounts agree that Cleopatra’s ships had their masts and sails aboard, her flight must have been intended from the beginning, apparently in the hope of getting the war chest to Egypt so her party could regroup and continue the fight from there. Octa-vian’s army pursued Cleopatra and Antony to Egypt, where both soon committed suicide to avoid falling into his hands.
