Cleopatra Had Planned Flight From Egypt But Nabateans Burned Her Ships

Summary: After defeat by Julius Caesar's great-nephew Octavian in the Battle of Actium, Cleopatra had planned flight from Egypt but Nabateans burned her ships.

"The Flight of Antony and Cleopatra From the Battle of Actium," ca. 1897 oil on canvas by Gateshead-born Agnes Pringle (1853-1934); bequeathed 1934 by artist to Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle Upon Tyne, Tyne and Wear, North East England: History of the World @HiistoryOfTheWorld, via Facebook April 16, 2021

After Julius Caesar's great-nephew Octavian defeated Mark Antony and her in the Battle of Actium, Cleopatra had planned flight from Egypt but Nabateans burned her ships.

Gaius Octavius "Octavian" (Sep. 23, 63 BCE-Aug. 19, 14 CE), great-nephew of Roman general and statesman Gaius Julius Caesar (July 12 or 13, 100-March 15, 44 BCE), defeated Ptolemaic Queen Cleopatra VII Philopator (Ancient Greek: Κλεοπάτρα Φιλοπάτωρ, Kleopatra Philopator; ca. 69-Aug. 10 or 12, 30 BCE) and Roman militarian and politician Marcus Antonius "Mark Antony" (Jan. 14, 83-Aug. 1, 30 BCE) in the Battle of Actium. The naval battle took place Sep. 2, 31 BCE, a little over 13 years five and one-half months after the Ides of March assassination of Octavian's great-uncle. The Battle of Actium (Ancient Greek: Ἄκτιον, Aktion) was waged in the Ionian Sea (Greek: Ιόνιο Πέλαγος, Ionio Pelagos), off the west central Greek coast's Actium promontory.

Cleopatra's sixty ships "suddenly" left the battle by plunging "through the midst of the combatants" while "the sea-fight was still undecided and equally favourable to both sides," according to Greek biographer Plutarch (46 BCE-ca. 122 CE) in his biography of Antony in Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans, commonly known as Parallel Lives. "The enemy looked on with amazement, seeing that they took advantage of the wind and made for Peloponnesus" (vol. IX, LXVI, page 289).

Immediately upon sighting Cleopatra's departure, Antony likewise abandoned the battle "to those who were fighting and dying in his cause." He switched to "a five-oared galley, where Alexas the Syrian and Scellius were his only companions, and hastened after the woman who had already ruined him and would make his ruin still more complete," according to Plutarch, who advantaged every opportunity to dishonor Cleopatra.

After approximately three days' sailing, Cleopatra and Antony disembarked at Taenarum (Ancient Greek: Ταίναρον, Taenaron), at the tip of the Laconia (Greek: Λακωνία, Lakonia) region's Mani (Greek: Μάνη, Mane) peninsula in the southeastern part of southern Greece's Peloponnese (Greek: Πελοπόννησος, Peloponnesos) peninsula. Some of "their heavy transport ships and some of their friends" joined them with information on their fleet's destruction by Octavian's victory at Actium and with the assessment that "the land forces still held together" (vol. IX, LXVII, page 291).

From the Peloponnese, Cleopatra and Antony ventured southeasterly to the Libyan coast, where he "sent Cleopatra forward into Egypt from Paraetonium" (vol. IX, LXIX, page 295). The Mediterranean port of Paraetonium (American Greek: Παραιτόνιον, Paraitonion), modern-day's Mersa Matruh, lies in northwestern Egypt, west of north central Egypt's wonder-filled cosmopolitan port of Alexandria.

Antony remained in Libya with two friends, Aristocrates, a Greek rhetorician, and Lucilius, a Roman. They had missioned themselves with preparing Antony's Libya-stationed forces for engagement with Octavian, but they experienced betrayal instead. "When the general to whom his forces in Libya had been entrusted brought about their defection, Antony tried to kill himself, but was prevented by his friends and brought to Alexandria" (vol. IX, LXIX, page 295).

In Alexandria, Antony "found Cleopatra venturing upon a hazardous and great undertaking" in the Red Sea, Plutarch's designation for the upper Arabian Gulf, and the lower Arabian Gulf. Plutarch explained: "The isthmus, namely, which separates the Red Sea from the Mediterranean Sea of Egypt and is considered to be the boundary between Asia and Libya, in the part where it is most constricted by the two seas and has the least width, measures three hundred furlongs. Here Cleopatra undertook to raise her fleet out of water and drag the ships across, and after launching them in the Arabian Gulf with much money and a large force, to settle in parts outside of Egypt, thus escaping war and servitude. But since the Arabians about Petra burned the first ships that were drawn up, and Antony still thought that his land forces at Actium were holding together, she desisted, and guarded the approaches to the country" (vol. IX, LXIX, pages 294-297).

The Nabatean Arabs were Arabian Desert nomads who settled the northern Arabian peninsula. The Nabateans established the Neolithically-dated Raqēmō, Petra (Ancient Greek: Πέτρα, petra, "rock") in present-day southern Jordan, as their capital by the fourth century BCE.

In his historical compendium of ancient Rome, Roman History (Ῥωμαϊκη Ἱστορία, Historia Romana), written in Greek, Roman historian Lucius Cassius Dio (ca. 155-235 CE), known as Dio Cassius, elaborated the increasingly doomed couple's Red Sea activities as strategizing three maritime missions. "But to return to Antony and Cleopatra, they were indeed making their preparations with a view to waging war in Egypt both on sea and on land, . . . making ready, none the less, to sail to Spain if need should arise, and to stir up a revolt there by their vast resources of money and both other means, or even to change the base of their operations to the Red Sea" (Dio's Roman History, Vol. VI, Book LI.6, page 19). Dio Cassius identified Quintus Didius, Octavian-appointed governor of the Roman province of Syria, as instigator of the ship-burning spree by "the Arabians" (vol. V, Book LI.7, page 21).

The destruction of her ships closed Cleopatra's option of flight from Egypt to possibly friendly places beyond the Red Sea. She resuscitated, however, her vision of the Red Sea as conduit to the safety of lands, such as India, along the North Indian Ocean's Arabian Sea for her son by Julius Caesar, Ptolemy XV Caesar Philopator Philometor (Ancient Greek: Πτολεμαῖος Καῖσαρ Φιλοπάτωρ Φιλομήτωρ, Ptolemaios Kaisar Philopator Philometor, "Ptolemy Caesar, Beloved of his Father, Beloved of his Mother"; 47-30 BCE), known as Caesarion (Ancient Greek: Καισαρίων, Kaisarion, "Little Caesar"). Flight from Egypt to refuge in India, nevertheless, was foiled also for Caesarion.

Cleopatra's outstretched arms in barge with figurehead possibly of Fortuna, Roman goddess of fortune (lower left), express hopelessness of the Battle of Actium; "The Battle of Actium, 2 September 31BC," 1672 oil on canvas by Flemish marine painter Lorenzo A. Castro (Laureys a Castro; ca. 1640-ca. 1700); National Maritime Museum, Palmer Collection, Greenwich, London UK: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

"The Flight of Antony and Cleopatra From the Battle of Actium," ca. 1897 oil on canvas by Gateshead-born Agnes Pringle (1853-1934); bequeathed 1934 by artist to Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle Upon Tyne, Tyne and Wear, North East England: History of the World @HiistoryOfTheWorld, via Facebook April 16, 2021, @ https://ms-my.facebook.com/HiistoryOfTheWorld/posts/2603869626580103/; Can be used for non-commercial research or private study purposes, and other UK exceptions to copyright permitted to users based in the United Kingdom under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, as amended and revised, via Art UK

Cleopatra's outstretched arms in barge with figurehead possibly of Fortuna, Roman goddess of fortune (lower left), express hopelessness of the Battle of Actium; "The Battle of Actium, 2 September 31BC," 1672 oil on canvas by Flemish marine painter Lorenzo A. Castro (Laureys a Castro; ca. 1640-ca. 1700); National Maritime Museum, Palmer Collection, Greenwich, London UK: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Castro_Battle_of_Actium.jpg; via Royal Museums Greenwich (RMG) @ https://www.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/rmgc-object-11743

For further information:

Balzat, Jean-Sébastien; and Benjamin W. Millis. "M. Antonius Aristocrates: Provincial Involvement with Roman Power in the Late 1st Century B.C." Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, vol. 82, no. 4 (October-December 2013): 651-672.
Available @ https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2972/hesperia.82.4.0651.

History of the World @HiistoryOfTheWorld. "The Flight of Antony and Cleopatra from the Battle of Actium, Agnes Pringle (1853–1934)." Facebook. April 16, 2021.
Available @ https://ms-my.facebook.com/HiistoryOfTheWorld/photos/2603869626580103/
Available @ https://ms-my.facebook.com/HiistoryOfTheWorld/posts/2603869626580103/

Lucius Cassius Dio. ". . . . After his unexpected setback, Antony took refuge in his fleet, and was preparing to give battle on the sea or at any rate to sail to Spain. But Cleopatra, upon perceiving this, caused the ships to desert . . ." Book LI.10, page 29. Dio's Roman History, vol. VI. With an English Translation by Earnest Cary, Ph.D. On the Basis of the Version of Herbert Baldwin Forster, Ph.D. Loeb Classical Library LBL 175. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA Harvard University Press, MCMLV [1955].
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/diosromanhistory06cassuoft/page/29/mode/1up

Lucius Cassius Dio. ". . . . But to return to Antony and Cleopatra, they were indeed making their preparations with a view to waging war in Egypt both on sea and on land, and to this end they were calling to their aid the neighbouring tribes and the kings who were friendly to them; but they were also making ready, none the less, to sail to Spain if need should arise, and to stir up a revolt there by their vast resources of money and by other means, or even to change the base of their operations to the Red Sea. . . ." Book LI.6, page 19. Dio's Roman History, vol. VI. With an English Translation by Earnest Cary, Ph.D. On the Basis of the Version of Herbert Baldwin Forster, Ph.D. Loeb Classical Library LBL 175. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA Harvard University Press, MCMLV [1955].
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/diosromanhistory06cassuoft/page/19/mode/1up

Lucius Cassius Dio. "While these negotiations were proceeding, the Arabians, instigated by Quintus Didius, the governor of Syria, burned the ships in the Arabian Gulf which had been built for the voyage to the Red Sea, and the peoples and princes without exception refused their assistance to Antony." Book LI.7, page 21. Dio's Roman History, vol. VI. With an English Translation by Earnest Cary, Ph.D. On the Basis of the Version of Herbert Baldwin Forster, Ph.D. Loeb Classical Library LBL 175. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA Harvard University Press, MCMLV [1955].
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Perrin, Bernadotte, trans. "LXVI. . . . suddenly the sixty ships of Cleopatra were seen hoisting their sails for flight and making off through the midst of the combatants . . . . For no sooner did he see her ship sailing off than he . . . got into a five-oared galley . . . and hastened after the woman . . ." Pages 288-289. Plutarch's Lives, vol. IX: Anthony, pages 138-333. In eleven volumes. Loeb Classical Library. First printed 1920. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, MCMLIX [1959].
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/plutarchslives09plutuoft/page/288/mode/1up
Available via Topos Text @ https://topostext.org/work/180

Perrin, Bernadotte, trans. "LXVII. Cleopatra recognized him and raised a signal on her ship. . . . He . . . then put in at Taenarum . . . . Presently not a few of their heavy transport ships and some of their friends began to gather about them . . . bringing word . . . that, in their opinion, the land forces still held together. . . . Antony . . . purposed to cross from Taenarum to Libya . . . ." Pages 288-293. Plutarch's Lives, vol. IX: Anthony, pages 138-333. In eleven volumes. Loeb Classical Library. First printed 1920. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, MCMLIX [1959].
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/plutarchslives09plutuoft/page/288/mode/1up
Available via Topos Text @ https://topostext.org/work/180

Perrin, Bernadotte, trans. "LXIX. After Antony had reached the coast of Libya and sent Cleopatra forward into Egypt from Paraetonium, he had the benefit of solitude . . . with two friends, one a Greek, Aristocrates a rhetorician, and the other a Roman, Lucilius, about whom I have told a story elsewhere. . . . When the general to whom his forces in Libya had been entrusted brought about their defection, Antony tried to kill himself, but was prevented by his friends and brought to Alexandria. Here he found Cleopatra venturing upon a hazardous and great undertaking. . . ." Pages 294-297. Plutarch's Lives, vol. IX: Anthony, pages 138-333. In eleven volumes. Loeb Classical Library. First printed 1920. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, MCMLIX [1959].
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/plutarchslives09plutuoft/page/294/mode/1up
Available via Topos Text @ https://topostext.org/work/180

Perrin, Bernadotte, trans. "LXXI. . . . As for Antony . . . . , he forsook that dwelling of his in the sea, which he called Timoneum, and after he had been received into the palace by Cleopatra, turned the city to the enjoyment of suppers and drinking-bouts and distributions of gifts, inscribing in the list of ephebi the son of Cleopatra and Caesar, and bestowing upon Antyllus the son of Fulvia the toga virilis without purple hem . . . ." Pages 300-303. Plutarch's Lives, vol. IX: Anthony, pages 138-333. In eleven volumes. Loeb Classical Library. First printed 1920. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, MCMLIX [1959].
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/plutarchslives09plutuoft/page/300/mode/1up
Available via Topos Text @ https://topostext.org/work/180

Perrin, Bernadotte, trans. "L. Now, there was a certain Lucilius, a brave man, among the comrades of Brutus. . . ." Pages 238-241. Plutarch's Lives, vol. VI: Brutus, pages 125-247. In eleven volumes. Loeb Classical Library. First printed 1918. London: William Heinemann Ltd; Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, MCMLIV [1954].
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/plutarchslives06plutuoft/page/238/mode/1up
Available via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/plutarchs-lives-in-11-volumes.-vol.-6-loeb-98/page/238/mode/1up
Available via Topos Text @ https://topostext.org/work/181