Who actually was Cleopatra's mother?
Was she African?
Was she Egyptian?
Was she Cleopatra V Tryphaenana?
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Cleopatra’s mother is still one of the many mysteries that the whole world have not yet solved about Cleopatra. However, many different organisations and historians have done their investigating and have their different views. The four main ones are: she was African, she was Cleopatra’s father’s sister, she was Egyptian and her father had many different wives. Interestingly quite a few historians agree that in fact Cleopatra’s mother was hidden and Cleopatra and her siblings did not know much about her either. Cleopatra’s mother died before Cleopatra turned 12 - one year before her father died. Historians believe that discovering who Cleopatra’s mother is will unlock many things that we still do not know about Cleopatra, such as her appearance and what she really looked like.
One belief is that Cleopatra’s mother was African. This is the belief of the majority of the BBC. They believe this because they think they have found the remains of Cleopatra’s sister Arsinoe in Ephesus, Turkey. Apparently her sister seems to have an “African” skeleton. We know that Cleopatra’s father was not African but Greek so this must mean that an African was married into the family. The only option left is Cleopatra’s mother. Hike Thuer discovered this skeleton and he is from the Austrian Academy of Sciences. The BBC also believe that the discovery of this skeleton could also help explain Cleopatra’s and Arsinoe’s relationship to a further level. Another speculation is that Cleopatra’s mother was he father’s sister who was named Cleopatra V Tryphaenana. There is a belief that in the Ptolemy family intermarrying was a common fete (10 out 15 marriages were intermarriages) as it was a lot easier than trying to find a suitable partner in that time. It’s a bit strange to consider but it is a likely option for Cleopatra’s mother. Some people strongly believe that her father’s sister was no more than her aunt as they question why Cleopatra or any of her siblings had deformities or disabilities. Another option for Cleopatra’s mother is that she was an Egyptian. This is because the geographer Strabo believes and wrote that the wives of her father were of significance and important status. This immediately closes any slaves and opens up two popular ethnicities her mother could have been an Egyptian or on of the traditional Greek people. Apparently the Egyptian religion had already had a history of marrying into the Ptolemy family. It is thought that Cleopatra’s mother was Egyptian is because of the following reasons. To begin with Cleopatra was the only ruler in her dynasty who knew the Egyptian language. To learn how to speak Egyptian fluently she would have had to have been in association with an Egyptian speaker. Secondly Cleopatra’s daughter, Cleopatra Selene, honored the Egyptian beliefs and language even at her far off capital of Mauritanian Caesarean. This makes it seem that perhaps this language was important to her, as it was part of her ancestral family. The final reason is that the images of her in Roman and Greek artworks did not show anything except the traditional Mediterranean ethnicity. The final belief is that Cleopatra’s father had children with two different women. However these two women are still not known. In this theory it is believed the three eldest children (Cleopatra VI, Bernice IV and Cleopatra VII) Ptolemy had with one lady and the three youngest children (Arsinoe, PtolemyXIII and Ptolemy XIV) Ptolemy had with a different lady. This theory means that Cleopatra would not have had five full siblings but two siblings and three half siblings. |