Beyond the Last Cleopatra: The Forgotten Queens Who Ruled Before Her

Her name is legendary. Cleopatra VII, the last queen of Egypt, a ruler whose affairs with Caesar and Antony and dramatic suicide have made her an icon. But she was not the first. Before her came a dynasty of remarkable queens who shared her name, their stories of ambition, civil war, and political mastery now almost completely forgotten. For nearly two centuries (180-30 BCE), these women crafted the very tradition of female power that the last Cleopatra would inherit. Beyond the Last Cleopatra resurrects these forgotten rulers through meticulous analysis of papyri, inscriptions, and archaeological evidence. Meet Cleopatra I, the Syrian princess who became Egypt's first female regent; Cleopatra II, who declared herself sole ruler during civil war—even minting coins bearing only her image, a revolutionary act in the ancient world; and Cleopatra III, who controlled Egypt's vast wealth and commanded armies while keeping her sons as mere figureheads. By restoring these queens to their rightful place, this book transforms our understanding of history's most successful experiment in female sovereignty. It reveals that the last Cleopatra wasn't an anomaly but the culmination of a sophisticated political tradition—offering timely insights into how women have navigated paths to power in systems designed to exclude them.