Mark Gagnon

She was the first Ptolemaic ruler in 300 years to actually learn Egyptian.

It is said that she mastered Hebrew, Arabic, Ethiopian, and at least four other languages.

More importantly, she understood something that her ancestors missed, that if you want to rule Egypt, you got to get the Egyptians on your side.

Otherwise, you're going to be facing a revolution.

So when Cleopatra is born, Egypt is technically independent, but basically just a client state of the Roman Empire.

So, you know, it looks independent on paper, but in reality, it depends on Rome for protection and also money and financing and survival in general.

So when Cleopatra was a young woman, her father had been kicked out by his own people, and he only got the throne back because Rome basically supported him and

needed him to be in charge in order to continue pimping out the Egyptian economy.

So growing up, she watched her father constantly get humiliated not only by people internally within Egypt and the courts within Alexandria, but also by Roman politicians who just treated Egypt like

Like an ATM, like they were just, you know, going in there jacking it.

So Romans would show up and they'd want some loans and they want some exports and, you know, all the stuff that was growing in this very fertile part of the country and part of the world.

And they basically threatened to do a regime change if they didn't get paid.

Sound familiar?

This taught her two crucial lessons, right?

First, Rome is the real power in the Mediterranean.

And secondly, the only way to survive was to make you basically indispensable to the right Romans.

So she understands the political game from a very early age.

Then in 51 BC, she's about 18 years old, her father dies.

and leaves the throne to both Cleopatra and her 10-year-old brother, Ptolemy XIII.

And according to Egyptian tradition, they're supposed to get married to each other and rule this, you know, client state together.