Xenophobic Attitudes Toward Cleopatra VII - A Comparison of Historical and Poetic Texts

One of the most esoteric yet infamous women of world history, Cleopatra VII remains a leading female figure renown for her charm and beauty. Her notorious philandering led her to the tables-and beds-of the most powerful men in Rome, from the wanton consul Marc Antony to the great imperator Julius Caesar. What we know today about Cleopatra comes from a plethora of written sources, among them Suetonius' Lives of the Caesars, Plutarch's Life of Antony, Horace's Odes, and Propertius' Elegies. While the historical sources depict Cleopatra as a cunning sorceress, their poetic counterparts instead paint her as a drunken, foolish reprobate. However, these different literary sources reflect a common xenophobic attitude towards Cleopatra, exposing a latent fear of her as an egregious threat to Rome.

In the Divine Julius, Suetonius recounts the precarious relationship between Cleopatra and Julius Caesar. According to Suetonius, Julius Caesar was promiscuous, frequently associating with many different women, "but most particularly he loved Cleopatra" (Suetonius Divine Julius 52). Suetonius later adds, "with her, too, he journeyed by royal barge deep into Egypt" (Suetonius Divine Julius 52). Rome and Egypt were two separate worlds in the time of Julius Caesar; yet, Caesar was willing to both travel to Egypt to meet her as well as to invite her to Rome as his guest, effectively bridging the cultural and political gap. These circumstances must have been scandalous to the Roman people as Caesar's love affair was with a foreigner - a queen no less, in spite of his preexisting marriage to Calpurnia; Suetonius details the detrimental effect of this relationship by mentioning how willingly Caesar lends his own name to the child he produces by Cleopatra ("Caesarion") (Suetonius Divine Julius 52). Caesar had no male heirs at the time; Caesarion, if indeed legitimate, would ascend the throne as a foreign ruler - filius peregrinus. Cleopatra was a queen in her country, yet the Romans feared she was usurping the king of theirs. Suetonius encapsulates the public's perception of Caesar with a quote from one of his opponents, deeming him, "a man to every woman and a woman to every man" (Divine Julius 52). Indeed, Cleopatra tarnished the reputation of the man who was later honored as pater patriae, and divus, god of the Romans.

Suetonius describes Cleopatra's demise as the result of the struggle for power between Marc Antony and Octavian in the Divine Augustus. Gauis Julius Caesar Octavianus (Octavian), Caesar's adopted son and successor, was only 19 years old when his great-uncle was assassinated in 44 B.C. Knowing his weak political position, Octavian endeavored to repudiate his competitor, Marc Antony, for power, drawing upon the only political foothold he knew: Rome's fear of foreigners. Between 37 and 32 B.C., Octavian spread a propaganda campaign against the defunct consul and general, inculcating the Roman people with the idea that Marc Antony was no longer a Roman, but rather the puppet for a foreign queen. Octavian prepared for checkmate against Antony with the reading of his will in 37 B.C. "in order to demonstrate more clearly how Antony abandoned the ways of a Roman citizen" (Suetonius Divine Augustus 17). Cleopatra VII, as Suetonius implies, was the catalyst for Antony's defection and subsequent abandonment of Rome. Antony betrayed Rome by declaring his children by Cleopatra rightful heirs to the territories he conquered with Roman legions (Divine Augustus 17). Thus, Octavian as divi filius reaffirmed his father's legacy by expunging Cleopatra, Antony, and Caesarion from the political picture. Cleopatra, however, eluded Octavian by killing herself instead. Suetonius reveals Octavian's disappointment towards the suicide: "Cleopatra he greatly desired to lead as captive in his triumphal procession"; in other words, Octavian wanted to parade Cleopatra around the streets of Rome as spoils of war (Divine Augustus 17). The Romans were all too cognizant of Cleopatra's insidious influence on Roman men; Octavian thus emerged as the only Roman capable of eluding Cleopatra's charms. Octavian salvaged his father's tarnished reputation as a paramour to an Egyptian queen, utilizing Rome's xenophobic attitude towards Cleopatra as a means for his political gains.

Like Suetonius' work, Plutarch's Life of Antony demonstrates a true fear of Cleopatra, describing her cunning even in the last days of her life. When Antony arrived in Egypt to meet Cleopatra for the first time, she decided to use her "charms and sorceries" to "bring Antony to her feet" (Plutarch Life of Antony 25). Again, the genuine distrust of Cleopatra appears consistently in exaggerated fashion with descriptions of her appealing to witchcraft and sorcery. Plutarch provides an excellent example of Cleopatra's cunning, recounting how she deceived Antony, exhorting him to repeal his association with Octavia:

She therefore pretended to be passionately in love with Antony herself, and reduced her body by slender diet; she put on a look of rapture when Antony drew near, and one of faintness and melancholy when he went away.

(Plutarch Life of Antony 53)

By tricking Antony into thinking she was capable of suicide if he allowed Octavia to stay with him in Egypt, she forced Antony to reject his own wife, a noble Roman woman. This decision had disastrous consequences as the Roman people revered Octavia (Plutarch Life of Antony 54). This decision preceded Octavian's appeal to the Senate for military action in Egypt which culminated at Actium and Alexandria. In her desperation, with Roman legions running amok in her country, Cleopatra still utilized her cunning, even towards Octavian. Plutarch describes how she conceded all her treasures to Octavian, yet when one of her slaves discovers she was hording a secret stash of jewelry, she tells Octavian that she was preparing to give the jewelry to Octavia and Livia as a gift (Plutarch Life of Antony 83). This example of deception reiterates the general perception of Cleopatra as a duplicitous woman determined to destroy Rome, if not through military force, then by means of trickery. Her suicide was her final deception because she sacrificed herself to avoid being a public captive in Rome. Even Octavian is moved by her courageous audacity and as Plutarch tells us, he "admired her lofty spirit; and he gave orders that her body should be buried with that of Antony in splendid and regal fashion" (Plutarch Life of Antony 86). Plutarch evidently approves of Octavian's use of force to defeat Cleopatra because her charms and tricks even worked posthumously.

Horace, too, shares Plutarch's contention that Cleopatra is bent on Rome's destruction, yet he claims that she is a drunken, foolish, lunatic rather than a conniving sorceress. In Nunc est bibendum (Ode 1.37), Horace describes how overjoyed he is that Cleopatra - the "mad queen" -is finally dead. The speaker of the poem is probably Horace himself - a typical Roman well versed in Cleopatra's treachery. Horace describes Cleopatra in a disparaging way; he first declares her a queen of a "flock of contaminated men" whose goal is "the ruin of the Capitol" (Horace Odes 1.37.6-7, 9). In other words, Horace reveals his absurd fear that Egypt is planning to invade and conquer Rome. Moreover, Horace refers directly to Cleopatra, describing her as "crazed with hope" and "drunk with sweet fortune" (Horace Odes 1.37.10-12). According to Horace, the mad queen is too crazy to realize her own lofty goals. Oblivious to everything, Cleopatra failed to realize her own impending doom until she was "made to face real fears," that is, Octavian's invading army (Horace Odes 1.37.15). When Octavian's army catches up with her, Horace declares he is like the valiant and noble hawk and she is like the defenseless dove; he is the resourceful hunter and she is the doomed hare (Horace Odes 1.37.17-19). Unlike the sentiments of Plutarch and Suetonius, Cleopatra is here described as devoid of all sorceries and charms - a mere animal. Horace also contrasts her vice and weakness to highlight Octavian's strength and grandeur. Underlying Horace's hyperbolic conviction that Cleopatra is a drunken lunatic is a genuine fear of her as a foreign threat.

Propertius' Elegies 3.11 relies heavily on allusions familiar to Romans at the time to cast aspersions on Cleopatra in order to paint her as desperate and devious. The speaker of the poem, assuming the first person, admonishes his listeners of the pitfalls of women by drawing upon mythological sources to compare with Cleopatra. The speaker first alludes to perhaps the most treacherous, perfidious, yet desperate woman in Greek mythology: Medea (Propertius Elegies 3.11.9). According to popular Greek myth, Medea resorted to killing her own children out of desperation just to spite her unfaithful husband, Jason. Still other powerful allusions include the "ferocious Amazon" Penthesilea and the Babylonian queen Semiramis (Propertius Elegies 3.11.14, 22). Besides their beauty and cunning, the women in these references also share another feature: they all represent foreign women. According to Propertius, Cleopatra is like a Medea incarnate: a foreign queen with dangerous motives, capable of using sorcery to achieve her lofty goals. The speaker shifts gears to bring past lessons into the foreground. He describes Egypt as "noxious Alexandria, land most skilled in guile," appealing to the Romans' prejudices towards outsiders (Propertius Elegies 3.11.33). Propertius later relies on diction to characterize Cleopatra as "Canopus' prostitute queen," again slandering her for her vices and disreputable nature (Propertius Elegies 3.11.39). However, when the speaker begins talking about Augustus, the poem assumes an almost panegyric role. Augustus, according to the speaker is the pride of Rome, carrying Romulus' gear to fight the fulsome Egyptians (Propertius Elegies 3.11.50). By comparing Augustus to Romulus, the division between domestic and foreign is clearly accentuated; Romulus epitomizes Roman legacy while Cleopatra is a neo-Medea, a foreigner, a "female Mars" hell-bent on the destruction of Rome (Propertius Elegies 3.11.52, 58). The speaker's effusive praise of Augustus climaxes with allusions to Roman heroes who defeated Rome's most notorious enemies, such as Hannibal and Pyrrhus (Propertius Elegies 3.11.61-62). If Cleopatra is a neo-Medea, then Augustus is "Actium's Apollo"- the counterpoint to treachery and deceit (Propertius Elegies 3.11.69).

The distinction between the views of Roman poets and Roman historians towards Cleopatra is minute compared to the overarching phobia of Romans towards foreigners. From sources like Plutarch and Suetonius, Cleopatra's cunning is shown to take on supernatural qualities, yet in Propertius and Horace, her desperation and debauchery are emphasized. Regardless of whether Cleopatra was actually a drunken lunatic or an enchantress, the four authors offer insight into the mindset of typical Romans all too accustomed to enduring years of civil war. Perhaps it was the Romans desire for peace and stability amid years of internal strife which forced them to make a scapegoat out of Cleopatra.

Works Cited

Horace, "The Complete Odes and Epodes." Tr. David West. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.

Plutarch. Life of Antony. Comp. Thayer Bill. 24 Feb. 2007 .

Propertius, "The Poems." Tr. W.G. Shepherd. Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1985.

Suetonius, "Lives of the Caesars." Tr. Catharine Edwards. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.