Cleopatra

Cleopatra

The Project Gutenberg EBook Cleopatra, by Georg Ebers, Complete
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Title: Cleopatra, Complete
Author: Georg Ebers
Release Date: April, 2004 [EBook #5482] [Yes, we are more than one
year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on May 21, 2002]
Edition: 10
Language: English

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CLEOPATRA
By Georg Ebers

Translated from the German by Mary J. Safford

PREFACE.
If the author should be told that the sentimental love of our day was
unknown to the pagan world, he would not cite last the two lovers,
Antony and Cleopatra, and the will of the powerful Roman general, in
which he expressed the desire, wherever he might die, to be buried
beside the woman whom he loved to his latest hour. His wish was
fulfilled, and the love-life of these two distinguished mortals, which
belongs to history, has more than once afforded to art and poesy a
welcome subject.
In regard to Cleopatra, especially, life was surrounded with an
atmosphere of romance bordering on the fabulous. Even her bitterest
foes admire her beauty and rare gifts of intellect. Her character, on the
contrary, presents one of the most difficult problems of psychology.
The servility of Roman poets and authors, who were unwilling frankly
to acknowledge the light emanating so brilliantly from the foe of the
state and the Imperator, solved it to her disadvantage. Everything that
bore the name of Egyptian was hateful or suspicious to the Roman, and
it was hard to forgive this woman, born on the banks of the Nile, for
having seen Julius Caesar at her feet and compelled Mark Antony to do

her bidding. Other historians, Plutarch at their head, explained the
enigma more justly, and in many respects in her favour.
It was a delightful task to the author to scan more closely the
personality of the hapless Queen, and from the wealth of existing
information shape for himself a creature in whom he could believe.
Years elapsed ere he succeeded; but now that he views the completed
picture, he thinks that many persons might be disposed to object to the
brightness of his colours. Yet it would not be difficult for the writer to
justify every shade which he has used. If, during his creative work, he
learned to love his heroine, it was because, the more distinctly he
conjured before his mind the image of this wonderful woman, the more
keenly he felt and the more distinctly he perceived how fully she
merited not only sympathy and admiration, but, in spite of all her sins
and weaknesses, the self-sacrificing affection which she inspired in so
many hearts.
It was an author of no less importance than Horace who called
Cleopatra "non humilis mulier"--a woman capable of no baseness. But
the phrase gains its greatest importance from the fact that it adorns the
hymn which the poet dedicated to Octavianus and his victory over
Antony and Cleopatra. It was a bold act, in such an ode, to praise the
victor's foe. Yet he did it, and his words, which are equivalent to a deed,
are among this greatly misjudged woman's fairest claims to renown.
Unfortunately it proved less potent than the opinion of Dio, who often
distorted what Plutarch related, but probably followed most closely the
farce or the popular tales which, in Rome, did not venture to show the
Egyptian in a favourable light.
The Greek Plutarch, who lived much nearer the period of our heroine
than Dio, estimated her more justly than most of the Roman historians.
His grandfather had