Cleopatra’s death – and cultural afterlife

Summary

Cleopatra’s Death – and Cultural Afterlife

HistoryExtra Podcast | Host: Matt | Guest: Professor Islam Issa
June 13, 2026

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Episode Overview

In the final episode of HistoryExtra’s four-part series on Cleopatra, host Matt and historian Professor Islam Issa explore the dramatic events leading to Cleopatra's death and examine both the realities and enduring myths that surround her final days. The discussion investigates what happened after her demise, the fate of her children, and how Cleopatra’s legacy has been reinterpreted across cultures—from ancient Roman propaganda to modern pop culture. The episode emphasizes the complexity and human depth of Cleopatra, aiming to move beyond the cartoonish stereotypes.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

The Road to Cleopatra’s Death

[03:31–09:57]

• Donations of Alexandria Recap ([03:31])

  • Lavish festival where Cleopatra names herself "Queen of Kings" and her son Caesarion as "King of Kings." Romans see this as a hostile act.
  • "Octavian, at this stage, red flags. He has to respond." — Islam Issa [04:02]

• Rising Conflict with Rome ([04:44])

  • Antony and Cleopatra unite forces, preparing for inevitable war against Octavian.
  • They muster “about 100,000 soldiers and 800 battleships” for Actium.

• Battle of Actium and Cleopatra’s Retreat ([05:22–06:19])

  • Cleopatra suddenly retreats during the battle, speculated as a pragmatic move to protect herself and Egypt, rather than pure betrayal or romance.
  • "It's constantly one where she's trying to maintain a balance and not trying to put all her eggs in one basket, just in case. All her figs in one basket." — Islam Issa [05:59]
  • She sends gifts and even offers to abdicate the throne to safeguard her sons ([07:16]).

• Octavian's Conditions and Power Dynamics ([07:35–09:29])

  • Octavian is rumored to accept Cleopatra’s abdication only if Antony dies, seeing Antony as the true threat.
  • The city of Alexandria is surrounded by Roman troops. Antony is depressed; Cleopatra plots her next move amidst looming defeat.

The Final Act: Cleopatra’s Death

[09:30–15:35]

• Facing the End ([09:59–10:09])

  • Cleopatra’s choice: “The key decision appears to be taking her own life.”

• Fact vs Legend: Murder, Suicide, Asp ([10:29–14:55])

  • Islam Issa: “The chance of murder can’t be completely ruled out,” but most sources suggest suicide for agency and dignity.
  • She may have aimed to avoid humiliation in Rome—a common fate for defeated monarchs.
  • "Taking her own life was a way of dictating her own story, which is not out of character because she has done that throughout her life..." — Islam Issa [11:09]
  • Legend of the asp (Egyptian cobra) originates with later sources like Plutarch and Strabo. Symbolism of the cobra as royal protector.
  • "It could be a rumor of her own making...because the cobra is the sacred servant of the sun God, the royal protector. So this is a very royal death. It serves her narrative, that kind of heroic narrative." — Islam Issa [13:44]

• Mark Antony’s Demise ([15:00])

  • Antony’s suicide is less shrouded in myth; his death adds another layer to understanding Cleopatra’s choices.

Aftermath: The Fate of Cleopatra’s Family

[18:48–21:42]

• Caesarion and the Children ([19:02–20:48])
  • Caesarion is executed on Octavian’s orders; Antony’s children with Cleopatra are paraded in Rome, but only the daughter lives.
  • Daughter (Cleopatra Selene) marries King Juba II of Mauretania, builds a lighthouse in honor of Alexandria, and names her son Ptolemy.
  • "She continues the Ptolemaic line in some way, albeit thousands of miles away, that we have a new Ptolemy, who's Cleopatra's grandson." — Islam Issa [21:00]

Cleopatra’s Burial and Lost Tomb

[15:35–18:48]

• Burial place remains a mystery; legends mix with local Alexandrian beliefs.
• Octavian claims to honor Cleopatra's request for burial next to Antony, probably for propaganda.

Cleopatra’s Legacy & Cultural Portrayals

[23:46–36:06]

• Maternal Identity and Power ([24:02])

  • Unlike her own family, Cleopatra foregrounds her motherhood, presenting herself as Isis, and centers her children in her legacy.
  • "...She championed her children...emphasizing her role as mother, not just as queen." — Islam Issa [24:21]

• Scholar, Multilingual, and Intellectual ([24:36–25:53])

  • Sources outside the Western canon, like 10th-century Arabic historian Masoudi, celebrate Cleopatra’s wisdom, linguistic prowess, and education.
  • Plutarch notes she spoke a dozen languages and debated with men.

• Cultural Bubbles and Roman Propaganda ([25:53–27:52])

  • Modern views shaped by Roman sources and later traditions, not always reflective of reality.
  • Rome’s victors crafted her as a seductress; local and Arabic traditions revere her intellect and leadership.
  • Destruction of the Library of Alexandria possibly led to the loss of more nuanced records of Cleopatra’s reign.

• Gender, Femininity, and Attraction ([27:58–29:08])

  • Cleopatra owned her femininity and powers of attraction, both visual and intellectual.

• Real Relationships with Caesar and Antony ([29:08–31:47])

  • Relationship with Caesar: youthful, strategic, power dynamics at play.
  • Relationship with Antony: genuine affection, shared experiences (clubs, pranks), and humor.
    • "[Antony] pays his men to put fish there for him…it’s the laughingstock then of everyone…She has a sense of humor." — Islam Issa [30:54]

• Melding of Cultures ([32:09–32:47])

  • Cleopatra’s reign marked by synthesis of Greek and Egyptian customs, language, and religion.

• Reassessing Myths: Milk Baths, Perfume, and Beauty ([32:52–35:40])

  • Myths such as bathing in milk or excessive seduction are rooted in misunderstandings or deliberate propaganda.
  • Evidence supports her use of cosmetics (kohl), possession of perfumes, and emerald jewelry—often for cultural or medicinal reasons.

Why Cleopatra Endures

[37:56–39:27]

• Cleopatra represents the end of an epoch—last pharaoh, end of Egyptian sovereignty, rise of Roman Empire.
• Her challenge to Rome, intellect, and charisma, coupled with her status as a female ruler in a male-dominated world, ensure her resonance through history.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Cleopatra’s Agency:
  "Taking her own life was a way of dictating her own story, which is not out of character..." — Islam Issa [11:09]

• On the Asp Legend:
  "This is a very royal death. It serves her narrative..." — Islam Issa [13:44]

• On Cultural Bubbles:
  "We can live in our own echo chambers and bubbles...it's also popular culture, which I think emphasizes some aspects more than others." — Islam Issa [26:38]

• On the Power of Myth:
  "If we think about that in practical, real world terms, it does have a connection to something that feels real..." — Host Matt [33:07]

• On Lineage and Identity:
  "At the end of the day, it's not about the bloodline. I think she was very much a Hellenistic and Egyptian queen." — Islam Issa [37:23]

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Important Timestamps

• [03:31]: Recap of the Donations of Alexandria
• [04:44]: Antony and Cleopatra prepare for war
• [06:19–07:15]: Cleopatra’s retreat and diplomatic overtures to Octavian
• [09:30]: Alexandria surrounded; Antony in despair
• [10:04]: Cleopatra’s decision to end her life
• [13:04]: Origins of the asp/poison myth
• [15:35]: Fate of Mark Antony and mystery of Cleopatra’s tomb
• [18:48]: The Roman Empire’s dawn; what happens to Cleopatra’s children
• [24:02]: Cleopatra as a mother
• [24:50]: Cleopatra as a scholar and linguist
• [27:58]: Debating Cleopatra’s feminity and attractiveness
• [29:22]: Realities of her relationships with Caesar and Antony
• [32:09]: Cleopatra as a cultural amalgamator
• [33:33]: Myths like milk baths and origins of such stories
• [34:04]: Elizabeth Taylor and cultural depictions
• [37:56]: Lasting legacy—why Cleopatra endures

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Concluding Thoughts

Professor Islam Issa and host Matt artfully disentangle the myths and counter-myths of Cleopatra, restoring her as a multifaceted, human figure: a politically astute leader, loving mother, intellectual, and cultural icon whose story marks a hinge-point in world history. Rather than just the seductress of Roman myth, the Cleopatra here is one whose life and death mattered, whose memory endures for both great accomplishments and heartbreaking losses, and whose story is continually rewritten by each generation.

“She’s a strong character in an extraordinary period of history.” — Matt [39:24]

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Transcript

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[History Extra Host Matt]

Welcome to the History Extra podcast. We've got the last installment today of our four part Sunday series on the life and cultural afterlife of Cleopatra. And I'm joined once again by Islam Issa, professor of Public humanities at Birmingham City University and author of numerous books, including the City that Changed the World. Today we're going to be exploring the final chapter of Cleopatra's story. The events that led to her death, what happened next, and why this ancient queen continues to captivate us thousands of years later.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Islam, thank you so much for being back with us as we go into the fourth and final episode of our series, Exploring Cleopatra. We left the previous instalment on something of a cliffhanger. We were talking about the donations of Alexandria, which was a part party, part coronation. I think it's right to say that was held that, as we alluded to in that episode, was going to have enormous and unintended consequences. Can you just bring us back up to speed as to what this festival was and then what was to happen next?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, it's a festival that really cemented the relationship between Antony and Cleopatra. It's one in which Cleopatra distributed the lands of her empire among her children, who are the son of Caesar and the children of Mark Antony. She named herself Queen of Kings and her son Caesarean, King of Kings. But it was seen as something of a hostile move by the Romans because this is the kind of event that would ordinarily be for huge Roman victories and also because they hadn't approved of all the decisions that she had made. So Octavian, at this stage, red flags. He has to respond.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And how did he respond?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, his propaganda machine is in full swing, so there's no doubt now that they're enemies. And it's about who makes the first move. And it seems that Antony and Cleopatra decide to make the first move. They combine their soldiers, probably about 100,000 soldiers, they have 800 battleships, and they lead their troops to Actium, Greece to face Octavian. So they actually seem to make the first move because it's so obvious now that the two parties, if you like, can't coexist.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

This really delicately balanced relationship between these three people has finally started to break down once and for all.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

It's broken down and it's now clear that Octavian is not on Antony's side and that Antony and Cleopatra are on the same side. That being Said when the battle commences, Octavian can't quite finish off Antony's troops because Cleopatra's are behind him. But then Cleopatra makes a decision to retreat suddenly. She kind of sells Antony out at that moment, which I always think it's maybe getting him back because he ghosts her and they're twins for three years. But in all seriousness, I think she realizes that maybe she shouldn't get on Octavian's wrong side entirely. Is this the story of Cleopatra? It's constantly one where she's trying to maintain a balance and not trying to put all her eggs in one basket, just in case. All her figs in one basket.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Nice.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Just in case. Octavian is the one who emerges victorious, so she actually retreats.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

So even when as high as they are here, she is constantly making decisions on the fly between two different people, two different sides, and trying to do the best thing for her dynasty.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

It's to me, a kind of pragmatic way of thinking. There's probably some civil unrest in Alexandria as well. Why has the Queen left Egypt? Why is she fighting a sort of foreign war and she comes back to take control of Egypt again. So there's an element of pragmatism in that sense as well. And I think at this stage she probably knows that the end is near if she's not very careful. So she sends gifts to Octavian actually, at this stage. She's trying to manage that relationship with Octavian now as well. She sends him gold. She actually does something astonishing at this stage. She offers to abdicate the throne.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

I did not know this.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

She offers to abdicate the throne under the condition, however, that her sons can rule. Now, does she want to stay in Egypt when they're in power, or is she preparing some sort of exile, maybe eastwards? Well, we may never know.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

How was the offer received?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Octavian is said to have agreed under the condition that Antony dies. Oh, so we have that complexity here that actually maybe Octavian sees the real danger in this to be Antony, not so much Cleopatra's children. If I were to think like Octavian, I'd agree that gets rid of Cleopatra under the condition that Antony dies. Cleopatra loves her children, so she'll agree and then just kill her children. That's how I imagine Octavian would have been thinking at this stage when he agreed to that, under that condition. But what we're presented with here as well is Cleopatra having to make a decision. She has to make a decision between her own life. So she'd spare her own life, her children's lives, her family's legacy and dynasty, or Anthony. And I think the choice is pretty obvious that she would pick all of those things over Antony.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

It's an intense situation in an intense life story. You mentioned there, the battle of Actium, Am I right? Can you pick us back up with what's happening there and what its outcome was going to be?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, amidst all this negotiation, we don't quite know the extent to which Octavian trusted Cleopatra. To understand Cleopatra, sometimes we have to think through the perspectives of others as well. So I think thinking like Octavian here, he probably doesn't trust her. And he sends, at that time, the biggest Roman invading army to date towards Alexandria. So he sends over 40,000 troops. And the key go here is to overpower Cleopatra. And what happens after that is probably not the main question at this stage. I think he wants to defeat her.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And then this is a story that starts moving very quickly from this point. What is the next thing that we need to make sense of to chart the events in these final moments of Cleopatra's life?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

It's Octavian surrounding the city from east and west. Antony's said to be at this time depressed. Some reports say suicidal. Could be propaganda. But he doesn't seem to be very active in the process. And there's clearly only going to be one winner. And it's a matter now of Cleopatra trying to figure out what those next steps will be. How does she save the dynasty? And in all likelihood, how does she not have a humiliating end as well?

[History Extra Host Matt]

So, given this was a situation that

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

she was faced with, what does she decide to do?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

The key decision appears to be taking her own life.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And as we will go on to explore as this episode develops, this is one of the many moments in which Cleopatra's life is sort of shrouded by so many layers of myth and legend and storytelling that it's sometimes difficult to tell what actually happened. What is your take on the reality of what happens?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

A nuanced answer would start with the fact that, do we think that Octavian would have wanted her dead? And I'd say yes. So the chance of murder cannot be completely ruled out. Okay, I'm not going to sit here and say Cleopatra was murdered, but I'm just gonna say the chance of murder can't be completely, completely ruled out.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Yeah.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Slightly controversial statement, but it appears and sources would suggest, and I am of the opinion, that she did kill herself. Now, why she killed herself would be so that she's not imprisoned, paraded humiliatingly around Rome, which is in all likelihood what Octavian would have done with her. So taking her own life was a way of dictating her own story, which is not out of character because she has done that throughout her life, creating her own narrative, so to speak. So she had a spy network. So she would have known that Octavian had a plan to capture her, to parade her around Rome. And she actually sends Octavian a note which implies that she knows death is coming because she asks him to bury her in a dignified way next to Anthony. And surely that would trigger Octavian's army to quickly go to Cleopatra to ensure she doesn't do that, because she may also have treasures that he wants to know about that I don't know about transition period, but she knows a lot about Egypt and its natural resources and so on. So I don't think he wanted her dead immediately, not just to parade her, but I think she could have been useful in other ways, and he could have used her as a sort of bargaining tool with her children. There's a lot of advantages to her being captured alive. And on that note, I think she knew that it would be better for her to be dead. So she probably would have bathed, dressed in her best clothes. The Egyptians, of course, believed in the importance of the afterlife. She would have tried to prepare for that and then take her own life and create a narrative around that particular action.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

It's really humanizing to think about her potentially making these sorts of decisions, because so often when we think about these stories, they are stories. We think about them in almost quite cartoonish terms. And as I alluded to, in this episode, we're gonna be unpacking and exploring some of the myths.

[History Extra Host Matt]

One of the myths around her death

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

is connected to an asp and an asp bite. Where does this come from? And does it have any basis at all in anything real?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, the whole method of suicide isn't entirely clear. So the idea of poison gets mentioned by Plutarch. Plutarch is a century afterwards. He's biased towards the Romans. So it's the Roman historians who suggest the poison. And actually her personal physician, who's quoted by Plutarch, doesn't mention a cause of death. Where I'm at with that is poisons were researched in Alexandria. So there's a chance that she knew an effective, painless way to go. And we know that she was well read and that she was involved with the library and that kind of thing. So maybe she knew something of that sort. So I guess she would have placed it in a needle or something and maybe Put it into her arm as the most likely sort of place. The earliest extant source is Strabo, and he writes that she received a fig basket and that inside was this asp. Aspis in Greek, was actually the word for the Egyptian cobra. So that's where that story comes from. Now, the snake bite, which you ask about, that remains debatable. I think, in all likelihood, poison, snakebite, there's a lot of symbolism there. And actually to such an extent that it could be a rumor of her own making, like that she made before she died, because the cobra is the sacred servant of the sun God, the royal protector. So this is a very royal death. It serves her narrative, that kind of heroic narrative. And then obviously with popular culture later, the bite on the arm gets moved to the breast. It's a kind of more sexualized view of Cleopatra. We get that in Shakespeare, for example.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

So you think poison potentially. But the rest of it, I would say less certain.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, the rest is less certain. I can see the asp being her own narrative.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And Mark Anthony has also died by this point. What do we know about that part of the story?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, Mark Antony was said to be not in a good place at this stage. He's given up on his own ambitions. There's a chance that both Antony and Cleopatra know that the other person is about to die, so they see even less reason to live, so to speak. If we're thinking about why would Cleopatra commit suicide? This is a good comparative point because it tells you, look how much more weight her death has than Antony's.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And to return to the nature of Cleopatra's death, do we know what happened to her body after she died?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, it's a big mystery. Where is the tomb of Cleopatra? Where is the tomb of Alexander, for that matter? Both supposedly in Alexandria. It's interesting because when you go to Alexandria, people have theories about where those tombs are. My theory is that it's under my auntie's herb garden.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

You heard it here first. Incredible. Excellent.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, that's not my real take on this.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

As an historian, it's good to clarify this.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, well, surprise, surprise. The Roman sources tell us that Octavian honoured her request by giving her a gracious burial alongside Mark Anthony. So clearly Octavian is still using that propaganda tool to show how great he is, because look how he's honoured her. Now, I don't necessarily buy that idea that he gave her a royal funeral. I just. Based on everything we've discussed in this podcast, can you see Octavian giving her a royal funeral? Maybe. Maybe Not. And so he may have feared that the couple would be venerated, especially Cleopatra. She was seen as like an incarnation of the goddess Isis. So is it possible that he buried them in an anonymous location or buried them anonymously so people don't, in future, don't know where they are? Is it possible that he buried them a bit further away from Alexandria, from the city? Is it possible that he cremated them? I think those are all viable questions to ask.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And you think they are all viable questions. They're all in the running.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, I do. I think they're all in the running. Something in me wants them not to be. I want the tomb of Cleopatra to be found. It would be the most amazing discovery. And Alexandrians do believe, as part of our culture that the tomb of Cleopatra is somewhere in that region. And likewise the tomb of Alexander the Great, which has been lost. The tomb of Alexander's. Fascinating that it's been lost because we have records of Roman emperors going there, including Caesar and Octavian. They went to the tomb of Alexander. Where did that go? And interestingly, when Octavian arrives and takes Alexandria, a few things happen, among them related to Alexander the Great's tomb, which is that apparently he goes to the tomb presumably to be blessed by Alexander or out of respect for Alexander, and breaks Alexander's note. And I think, talking of propaganda, that's a symbolic story about how the Romans weren't quite welcome at the time, that they were changing the landscape. They didn't understand Alexander's vision for a kind of metropolis and that kind of thing. But also to commemorate the victory, he becomes Augustus and changes the name of the month to August is the month in which he entered Alexandria, because it can't just be Julius Caesar, who has a month named after him after all. So it's obviously a really important event. And talking of importance, this is the shift. Now, Cleopatra's story is so important because this is the shift in world history that we go from the Roman Republic to the Roman Empire.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

It's one of the biggest moments in ancient history, certainly, if not wider history, as you're saying. What other repercussions in the immediate aftermath of Cleopatra's death? Should we talk about what happened, for instance, to her children?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, it's no surprise that Caesarion, Little Caesar's immediately killed, Octavian's advised to do so, and seems like a very obvious thing to do. So not only is Caesar assassinated, but Caesar's son is assassinated, which we don't really think about when we think of Caesar's assassination.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

We don't think of it in those terms. Yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

So that's the key, son, that she was sort of preparing for this role. So I said earlier that Cleopatra doesn't want to get paraded around Rome. So you can guess what happened to her children, the ones, you know, Antony's children, the three children taken to Rome and they're paraded humiliatingly around Rome and only one of them is spared. So her daughter from Antony, who's called Cleopatra, is spared, whereas the other children are not. And Octavian seems to have had some inclination that it was important to keep her as some sort of tool because what he does is he marries her to a king. He marries her to King Juba II of Mauritania. Mauritania is a kind of empire. We're talking sort of modern day Algeria. So she ends up there, which is. Which is fascinating that Cleopatra's only surviving child ends up in Mauritania, which is about 2,000 miles away. So northwest Africa. One thing that I was really intrigued to discover when I was researching this story for my book is that because the book is about Alexandria and how important, for example, the lighthouse was as an ancient wonder of the world, is that Cleopatra's daughter builds like a mini lighthouse 2,000 miles away as a way of honoring her city, which is really.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

That's beautiful.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

It is, isn't it? It's an unexpected little touch. It's a quiz for you now, Matt.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Oh, God.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

What's she going to name her son?

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Oh, oh, I know this. Ptolemy.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Ptolemy, right. So again she continues the Ptolemaic line in some way, albeit thousands of miles away, that we have a new Ptolemy, who's Cleopatra's grandson, and that he becomes king. He becomes Ptolemy of Mauretania. And what's fascinating is that he travels to Alexandria to see the city of his ancestors. And he rules until around the year 40. We're in the common era now until intervention from, guess who? The Romans. And they seize Mauritania. Caligula takes Mauritania. But some sort of really human continuity in the story as well.

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That's right. And if you want to check it out, no Such Thing as a Fish is available wherever you get your podcasts.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

I'd like to talk for a bit now about some of the other ways in which we should think about Cleopatra, and there's a whole range of them. Do you think we need to think about her love for her children and carrying that through as one of the most important things for her as a key part of this story?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, I think so. In the context of, for example, her father killed her sister. So that's the comparative point we've got here. It's quite an extreme comparative point. Yes, she championed her children because she wanted the continuation of power and dynasty, but she also did it in a way that was very clearly supposed to be emphasizing her role as mother, not just as queen, not least presenting herself as Isis, who's the mother of Horus in Egyptian mythology. So it's a very important part of her as a complete person.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And another thing that you've really highlighted across these four episodes is Alexandria as a seat of great learning and great wisdom and knowledge. Should we see Cleopatra in these same terms? Should we see her as being a great linguist or a great scholar.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

I think that's something that's very often overlooked in her story because there are other, more exciting, sexier elements to the story, but also because Western Egyptology has often stuck with the same sources and because the Roman sources that were so biased have portrayed her as a seductress and emphasized certain aspects of her. So the medieval Arabic texts, for example, talk about her being an intellectual. We know that she lived in a global knowledge capital. Even Plutarch writes about her speaking a dozen languages and how well read she was and that she would debate men. So certainly I don't think anybody should be doubting the extent to which she was educated. And from what I can see, the extent to which she was able to bring that into her political life by thinking outside the box, whether it worked or not. She's not necessarily an ordinary leader. She didn't just abide by the expectations that Rome had or her family had or the politics of the time.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

I'm really interested in that idea you mentioned there about how in other intellectual traditions or types of source or sources from other cultures, she is portrayed in a very different way to the stereotypical image that we might have. Why do you think those sources are not better known? And how stark is the difference in how she is portrayed?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, I think there's a language and culture thing. So the source I mentioned is 10th century Arabic, Masoudi. So that's not really part of the main sort of canon of history about her. There's also looking at things from an outsider kind of perspective. So if you go to Egypt today, you will see that she's very much loved in the same way that I was raised to think of her in a heroic way and found that quite normal. And only later in life did I encounter a different version of her and become quite shocked. So we can live in our own echo chambers and bubbles. Whether, I mean, one could argue the same in Egypt where she's a hero, but those are some of the reasons. There's also popular culture, which I think emphasizes some aspects more than others. The snake bites, everything that comes with that is much more interesting. And then I go back to the idea that Octavian had such a huge impact on how we portray her today through his writing, which was then the source for Plutarch, which is then the source for a lot of popular culture. One thing I would add is the library of Alexandria declined and was eventually destroyed or vanished. And that must have held some histories. And there's a chance that when she was finally out of the Picture that some of the texts about her were destroyed or never rewritten and so on. So the fact that ancient Alexandria or Cleopatra's Alexandria is partly under the water and partly under the modern city doesn't help either.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

So it's that and the propaganda that sort of skewed our picture of her.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

There's a lot there, isn't there? And then I don't think you can underestimate the popular culture as well, from art to literature.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And speaking of that popular culture, how do you think we walk the line of Cleopatra as a figure of femininity, of her as a sexual character? How do we balance these competing views of her and present a non cartoonish version of her as a woman?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Well, I think she was very proudly feminine. Like, I don't think she was hiding the fact she's a woman. And lots of what she did was emphasising that femininity, like the idea of mother, motherhood. The idea that she can rule alone as a woman is something I think she was very aware of. So I don't think she's hiding her femininity. And at the same time, there is nothing wrong with beauty, no matter what that beauty is. It might be a beauty of physical appearance, but it could also be a beauty in charisma, beauty in a smile. That's not something to be ashamed of, that we can say, oh, Cleopatra, maybe not beauty, maybe attractiveness. Cleopatra was attractive. I mean, she's attractive to us in this podcast, the way we're talking about her. She's obviously making us think about her and imagine her and so on, and that's nothing to be ashamed of.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

To return us to some of the other leading male figures of this story, can I get your sense of what the reality was of Cleopatra's relationship with them? How would you characterize those relationships?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

So with Caesar, she was very young, still a teenager, and he's quite a bit older, and he's a big celebrity and he's very powerful. So I imagine that they were attracted to each other for different reasons. She's young, she's ambitious. He is this person that she can maybe look up to or utilize. As for Anthony, I think it's a bit more complicated. So we do have some evidence that their relationship went beyond the political, so to speak, like they had fun. So Alexandria had all these clubs in it, and they sort of founded their own, the Inimitable Livers, which is a great name. So they were living their life. Plutarch writes about how extravagant they were. They would drink and have these big Dinners and debates and so on. So they spent time together out of choice, by the look of it, which I think always bodes well for a relationship. There's one reference to Cleopatra giving her books for the library, which wasn't completely destroyed by Caesar, but it was damaged. But that's an interesting little note. There's a fascinating story about them going fishing on the Nile, and they basically fish for perch. And Anthony pays his men to put fish there for him so that he doesn't look like he's terrible at fishing. And so she realizes this, apparently. And what she does is she then gets her people to put some. Probably like a tuna, something that just doesn't exist in the Nile, and a really big one. So that when he gets it out, he is the laughingstock then of everyone. Because how could you get this ocean fish out of the river?

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

That's a great story.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

And it really does tell me that she has a sense of humor. It also shows her knowledge of local customs because apparently she says to him, you know, leave fishing for the locals and that kind of thing. So I think they had a really good relationship at certain times. There's another story where they basically go around knocking on people's doors and running off, which is kind of immature. But the source says that the people loved it. But I imagine that the people couldn't really say, what are you doing? When they knocked off.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

The power dynamic in that situation is all wrong.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah. So, yeah, there's a lot to suggest that she had a good. But probably that she would have been disappointed when he eloped and left her with the twins for three years.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

That story paints these characters in a whole different light. I've never thought about them knocking doors and running away. It's incredible. On that note, are there any other ways in which you think we should view Cleopatra? We've sort of tried really hard across these four episodes to complicate her as a person, to introduce all sorts of other dimensions and nuance. Are there other traits that you think we should cover?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, I mean, the key to me is to humanize her. We've already been through that to some extent. Another aspect of that would be her ability to amalgamate cultures, which is a very important aspect of her rule. It suggested her understanding of the people that she was ruling. So this idea that the early Ptolemies championed Serapis as the God because he's a Greco Egyptian deity, and then that she speaks Egyptian and she speaks Greek, that she wears both Egyptian and Greek clothes, that she respects both the Egyptian and The Greek gods. I think that's a really important part of her.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And are there any other misconceptions about her that you'd like to dispel?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

I'm not sure I'd say dispel as such. I mean, I'd say we need to think about them a bit more logically and try to piece them together. You know, we have things like bathing in milk. There's probably no evidence of that, but we do know that the Egyptians cared for their skin.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

That's a really interesting one. You just mentioned the bathing in milk thing, because you're right. If we think about that in practical, real world terms, it does have a connection to something that feels real and to which we can identify. And I think that process of saying this might be a custom which has echoes or parallels in our own time is a really important way of making these stories feel part of history rather than some storybook story.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Exactly. And again, it's because they're humans, but piecing it together. That's why I love the idea of spatial history. So writing about the history of Alexandria really helps us understand Cleopatra because, for example, we find out the Egyptians found emeralds. So did she wear jewelry? Well, she probably did because she had a lot of emeralds at her disposal. And interestingly, emeralds became Liz Taylor's favorite jewelry later and so on.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Liz Taylor, of course, who played Cleopatra in the 1960s film of.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Exactly. So we can sort of deduce things like that. Did she like perfume? Well, we know that her ancestors with Alexander the Great actually went to Persia where they already had perfumes and where they found these oils and so on. And then we seem to have evidence that she may have had a perfume factory in Alexandria. So. Yeah, so we can start to piece some things together. It doesn't seem like that would be a private endeavor to have a perfume factory to probably stay, to endorse.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

When we say perfume factory, are we thinking of a factory in the modern sense?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Yeah, a place where people. Perfumes are made.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

A place where perfumes made and mixed, where oils and so on are mixed and different flowers and spices and that kind of thing. And it makes sense again because Aristotle wrote about that stuff. And we haven't mentioned Aristotle, but Aristotle was in some ways the intellectual godfather of Alexandria because he taught Alexander and Ptolemy I. So the first Ptolemy, her great, great grandfather, was taught by Aristotle. And that's a fascinating little insight because Aristotle's taught by Plato and Plato is taught by Socrates. So Ptolemy I and Alexander have a really interesting lineage of knowledge. And it made sense for the city to have a library and so on as a result. So, yeah, there's some stuff we can deduce that makes us think that these things could be true. The Kohlis, like the black eyeliner the Egyptians did use, that they did. So there's a very big chance that she did as well.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

So some of these things do have basis in fact. It's just unpicking the extent to which that is the case.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

It is. I think it's making sort of an intelligent estimate about it, rather than just speculating out of the blue. But it's also thinking about how it might have been normal, why she might have done it as well. It's not, you know, is she putting the eyeliner on to seduce the Romans? Now, actually, the main reason is because they believed it had medicinal advantages. So it's also thinking about the intentions behind all of that.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Is there anything else that you think before we wrap up any other cultural depiction of Cleopatra that you think we should just pause and reconsider?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

I'd say one is the destruction of the library. So we know that Caesar does, or his army does, set fire to the library, but it's not completely destroyed. We have references to it in later centuries, so it does undergo decline. And I think one of the ideas that she was involved in that period, in the destruction of the library is untrue. And actually she was, I would imagine, a champion of the great library of Alexandria because it was such an important symbol, but also because of the soft power that it gave her and gave the city and Egypt. And then one of the ideas is that she's a kind of drunken seductress that we get from the Roman sources. It's important to pause there. She did used to drink with Anthony and so on, but this idea that she was able to change the world for two powerful heroes from Rome, Mark Antony and Julius Caesar. And so the Roman sources would certainly have try to find a way of explaining that, and that's maybe where that comes from. One last thing as well is this idea that she's not necessarily Egyptian. Now, she was born, raised in Alexandria. Her family had been ruling there for centuries. It's a bit like saying the royal family today is not British, they're German or something. It doesn't quite add up to me. And the fact she emphasized her Egyptianness so much. So it's also about, you know, the fact that it's an enigmatic mother, enigmatic grandparents. Could they have been Egyptian? Did she have some Egyptian, but at the end of the day, it's not about the bloodline. I think she was very much a Hellenistic and Egyptian queen.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

That's really important to remember. For my final question, I'm going to ask something that feels faintly redundant given what we've talked about over the past four episodes. But why do you think it is the fact that we remember Cleopatra or over some of the other remarkable female figures from this story, from this period, what is it about her that has such staying power?

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Part of the answer to that is a bit sad, which is that she was the final pharaoh, so to speak. I mean, the Romans do champion themselves as pharaohs, but it's a slightly different thing then because Egypt is part of a bigger empire for the first time. Really, in that significant sense, Alexandria is no longer a empire capital, it's more of a country capital and so on. So the fact that these huge world events happen, they're regional events, but they have a big impact on world history. Let's say that it's the beginning of the Roman Empire, so the kind of the loss as well is part of it. And that loss is Rome's gain, Octavian's gain. Roman Empire is well and truly underway. But on that note, also the fact that she challenged Rome, the fact that she didn't give in to Rome in a way that might have been expected, that she's able to challenge Rome with these big characters like Julius Caesar in the frame, and also that she does so as a woman from Egypt and Egypt will always have this power to fascinate.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

She's a strong character in an extraordinary period of history.

[Podcast Guest Islam Issa]

Absolutely. Absolutely.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

And that's about it for this four

[History Extra Host Matt]

part series on Cleopatra Islam. Thank you so much again for such a fascinating look at this extraordinary woman. If you've enjoyed the series and want to go beyond the podcast, you can visit the History Extra app where I've curated a list of wider content related to her life and times. And next up in our Sunday series, Eleanor Evans will be speaking to Adam Smith about the American Revolution.

[History Extra Host Matt (Interviewer)]

Don't miss that. But for now, goodbye.

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