Caesar and Cleopatra Part.III

Tomb of Julius Caesar

Blinded by blood, Cesar covered his head with his robe. He said nothing until he saw Marcus Brutus make a thrust; his response was not   Et tu, Brute (“you too Brutus”) what actually said was “you too, my child?” Caesar had a long affair with Brutus’s mother and suspected he might be Brutus’s father. Caesar received 23 wounds; only one of which could be called fatal. The note, which they found in his hands after his death, fully disclosed the conspiracy. Had it been read, history would have been deprived of one of its most famous episodes.

Meanwhile, Cleopatra was busy consolidation her power. Two years after Caesar’s assassination, she took mark Antony, one of the triumvirate who now ruled the eastern part of the Roman Empire, as her lover. At Cleopatra’s behest, Antony murdered the last of Cleopatra’s Ptolemy rivals, and the two devoted themselves to a life of debauchery. Antony even left his Roman wife and married the Egyptian queen.

In later days Cleopatra was taken prisoner by Octavian. Cleopatra committed suicide in her chamber. Plutarch, the first century Greek historian, is responsible for the story that her death was caused by the bite of an asp, smuggled into her room in a basket of figs. However, the tale cannot be substantiated.  The asp was traditionally a symbol of Egyptian royalty and would have added a nice touch. But, then again, witnesses did notice two marks on her arm.