Learn how Cleopatra used her influence over Julius Caesar to stay in power
Learn how Cleopatra used her influence over Julius Caesar to stay in power
Learn how Cleopatra used her influence over Julius Caesar to stay in power.
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Transcript
Cleopatra, a woman who was purportedly power hungry and despotic. When she ascended to the throne in the first century BC, Rome was well established as the world's political epicenter. The Romans conquered the lands of the Mediterranean basin systematically. Egypt was still viewed as a sovereign state, controlled by Roman senators. The Romans are poised with whetted knives, for Egypt's riches. Its full granaries and treasures of gold and silver, make it a crucial supply station for the Roman juggernaut.
The empire on the Nile is in peril. Cleopatra is forced to engage all the resources at her disposal to stay in power. Knowing there is no way around Rome, she invites Caesar to Egypt. He is the most powerful man of the age, a politician striving to unite all political authority in his hand alone. The pomp of the Orient, the flourishing culture and vibrant history of the 5,000-year empire, impress the Roman. He falls for the pharaoh-queen, who presents herself as if she were a goddess. A seduction with consequences. The result of this passionate meeting is carved in stone on the back wall of Cleopatra's Temple: Caesarion, the name of the son Cleopatra and Caeser shared.
The wealthiest queen in the world continued to use her son as leverage to score in the game of world supremacy. Does the pharaoh want to rule Rome? Whether she did or not, this was many a Roman's worst nightmare as slaves carried Cleopatra to her now abode, a villa on the Tiber. She and her son would reside there for two years. Fear and fascination - the Romans are ambivalent about the fairy-tale queen from the banks of the Nile. When Caesar has a statue of the goddess erected in the Temple of Venus Genetrix that bears Cleopatra's likeness, public sentiment is soured. The down-to-earth Romans want nothing to do with a king who is being strung along by an Oriental queen. Historians record the result on the 15th of March of 44 BC: Caesar is dead. It is the end of Cleopatra's reign in Italy. Without Caesar's protection, she would never survive in Rome. She absconds, seeking shelter at home in the protective harbor of Alexandria. But her battle for stability and her struggle to remain in power continue unabated.
The empire on the Nile is in peril. Cleopatra is forced to engage all the resources at her disposal to stay in power. Knowing there is no way around Rome, she invites Caesar to Egypt. He is the most powerful man of the age, a politician striving to unite all political authority in his hand alone. The pomp of the Orient, the flourishing culture and vibrant history of the 5,000-year empire, impress the Roman. He falls for the pharaoh-queen, who presents herself as if she were a goddess. A seduction with consequences. The result of this passionate meeting is carved in stone on the back wall of Cleopatra's Temple: Caesarion, the name of the son Cleopatra and Caeser shared.
The wealthiest queen in the world continued to use her son as leverage to score in the game of world supremacy. Does the pharaoh want to rule Rome? Whether she did or not, this was many a Roman's worst nightmare as slaves carried Cleopatra to her now abode, a villa on the Tiber. She and her son would reside there for two years. Fear and fascination - the Romans are ambivalent about the fairy-tale queen from the banks of the Nile. When Caesar has a statue of the goddess erected in the Temple of Venus Genetrix that bears Cleopatra's likeness, public sentiment is soured. The down-to-earth Romans want nothing to do with a king who is being strung along by an Oriental queen. Historians record the result on the 15th of March of 44 BC: Caesar is dead. It is the end of Cleopatra's reign in Italy. Without Caesar's protection, she would never survive in Rome. She absconds, seeking shelter at home in the protective harbor of Alexandria. But her battle for stability and her struggle to remain in power continue unabated.