Cleopatra (lived 69–⁠30 BC)

Cleopatra came from the Macedonian dynasty of the Ptolemies. She inherited the throne in 51 BC from her father, at first jointly with her brother. Plutarch writes that she usually spoke with foreigners without an interpreter.

According to Plutarch, hidden in a bedding sack she met Caesar in Alexandria, and in 41 BC she sailed to Antony at Tarsus on a gilded barge. Scholars (Osgood, Schmaal) point out that her alliances had practical motives and that the picture of Cleopatra in Roman sources is largely Octavian’s propaganda.

After the defeat at Actium in 31 BC and Octavian’s entry into Alexandria in 30 BC, she took her own life. Egypt became a Roman province. The circumstances of her death are uncertain.