If the name is indelible, the image is blurry. Shakespeare attested to Cleopatra's infinite variety. In one of the busiest afterlives in history, she has become an asteroid, a video game, a cigarette, a slot machine, a strip club, a synonym for Elizabeth Taylor. Catastrophe reliably cements a reputation, and Cleopatra's end was sudden and sensational. She had a child with a married man, three more with another. For a fleeting moment she held the fate of the Western world in her hands. A goddess as a child, a queen at 18, at the height of her power she controlled virtually the entire eastern Mediterranean coast, the last great kingdom of any Egyptian ruler. She lost her kingdom once regained it nearly lost it again amassed an empire lost it all. Cleopatra VII ruled Egypt for 21 years a generation before the birth of Christ.
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