A legacy of strength

As the only daughter of Roman Triumvir Marc Antony and Egyptian Queen Cleopatra VII, Cleopatra Selene was expected to uphold traditional feminine virtues, to marry well, and strengthen her parents’ rule. Yet with their parents’ deaths by suicide, the princess and her brothers found themselves the inheritors of Egypt, a claim that placed them squarely in the warpath of the Roman emperor.

Cleopatra’s Daughter chronicles the life of Cleopatra Selene, a woman who, although born into royalty, was cruelly abandoned and held captive by Augustus Caesar. Creating a narrative from frescos and coinage, ivory dolls and bronzes, historian Jane Draycott shows how Cleopatra Selene navigated years of imprisonment on Palatine Hill and emerged a queen.

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