Oh Bummer: Egyptian queen Cleopatra was no stunner, coin shows

[devilgrrl]

From Yahoo's "Most Viewed" :eyes:

Egyptian queen Cleopatra was no stunner, coin shows

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070214/od_afp/britainegypthistory_070214171154

Wed Feb 14, 12:11 PM ET

LONDON (AFP) - When Shakespeare wrote that the face of Cleopatra, the ancient queen of Egypt, "beggar'd all description", he meant that words could not sum up her beauty.
ADVERTISEMENT

But a coin dating from 32BC and put on display in Britain Tuesday shows the phrase had an unintended double meaning -- it depicts the queen as no great looker with a pointed chin, thin lips and sharp nose.

Her lover, Mark Antony, fares little better on the coin's flipside -- the Roman general is shown with a hook nose, bulging eyes and a thick neck.

The portraits are a long way from the famously sultry depiction of the couple by Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor in the 1963 film "Cleopatra".

The coin has gone on display at Newcastle University, northeast England, on
Valentine's Day after years of lying in a bank.

more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070214/od_afp/britainegypthistory_070214171154

[CrazyOrangeCat]

1. yeah, but she was big fun at a party . . .

[jobycom]

2. Maybe the Romans and Egyptians weren't as shallow as Americans?

:shrug:

[Richard Steele]

8. And maybe coins made in 32BC weren't photographically accurate depictions?

[CatWoman]

18. Folks, we have a winner!!!

:)

Since HBO's Rome started its 2d season, I've been doing a lot of reading about the Queen, Antony and Julius C.

Some busts/photos of them are attractive; some are not:









Cleopatra


Julius




Antony

[jobycom]

34. If it was a Roman coin, it does.

The official coins tried to accurately portray their leaders. Marc Antony and Cleopatra have had busts and images made of them for millenia, now, and many were from people just imagining what they might have looked like. But the Roman coin would likely be the work of a sculptor whom they sat for.

That's not to say that the coin weathered badly over time. Edges of the image may have worn in a non-flattering manner.

From the article:

But Lindsay Allason-Jones, the university's director of archaeological museums, said that the image of her as a great beauty is comparatively modern, dating back to medieval English poet Geoffrey Chaucer.

"Roman writers tell us that Cleopatra was intelligent and charismatic and that she had a seductive voice, but, tellingly, they do not mention her beauty," she said.

(My note: either she was not notable to look at, or the Romans and Egyptians put less value in her looks than in her intelligence, charisma, and voice.)

[CatWoman]

39. "intelligence in a woman" was a non-entity for those guys

women were there to breed. period.

queens were there to breed future kings. period.

[jobycom]

52. Not accurate.

Intelligence in a woman was highly valued. Women ran the household. That's not a fancy way to say they were housekeepers. They organized the finances of the household, and controlled the household staff, comprised of servants and slaves. The more wealthy the household, the more they were responsible for, including spouses of dignitaries, who had large staffs and large coffers to control. Women raised and taught the children--male and female, until the male children began to train for a profession or trade.

Intelligence was valued highly, therefore, both because a wife needed to run a good household, and because intelligent women helped breed more intelligent children.

Society was highly segregated in Rome. The classes barely communicated, and men and women were largely segregated. Each gender had proscribed roles. Women were not given the same legal rights as men in their class, but the wife of a senator easily had more rights than a plebian male. And within her own household, she had rights over everyone except her husband.

Different world, different social structure. Not one we can understand easily. But when contemporaries praised Cleopatra's intelligence and charisma, they weren't empty words. They were impressed by these qualities. And notice--Cleopatra was a queen. She ruled on her own, not as the wife of a ruler. She was top dog in Egypt. Obviously, she was valued as more than a breeder.

[alittlelark]

23. See reply #20

[Hawkowl]

33. Roman art is very literal

Ancient Roman statues and portraits were done in a very lifelike, literal style with no room for artistic interpretation or romantic idealism. Statues depicted what the person actually looked like, warts and all. This is contrasted with the ancient Greek style, where the idealization of form was common place. Essentially, Greeks were big fans of air brushing the Romans, not allowed.

[xchrom]

3. oh who cares when you're the QUEEN OF EGYPT!!!

you could be ugly as SIN with a title like that.

[Seabiscuit]

55. Yeah, who cares when you get to be portrayed by a young Liz Taylor?

[AndyA]

4. I always suspected this, but I've known for years that Elizabeth Taylor

gave Cleopatra way too much credit for being beautiful. There was never any doubt that Liz was the greater beauty of the two. But if you were a woman and could choose who would portray you in a movie, Liz in her younger days was the only way to go.

And on top of that, she's a good actress. Hard to beat.

[WCGreen]

26. Vivian Leigh did a much better job in the Shaw play about

JC and Cleo...

Called Caesar and Cleopatra,,,

Claude Raines played JC...

Victor Mature was also in the movie...

[KittyWampus]

35. Wasn't Victor Mature in almost ALL of those movies about ancient empires?

:)

He had the "look".

[WCGreen]

36. Yea, I just Watched the Samson movie with Angela Landsbury

as the first wife...

[KansDem]

38. I liked Victor Mature in "Kiss of Death"

It was also Richard Widmark's first movie; the one where he pushes an elderly woman down the stairs. Very uneasy feeling.

[Deja Q]

53. And to top all that, Cleopatra had slaves. Fun to beat.

:(

[Poll_Blind]

5. Hey, looks ain't everything! Queen of Egypt? Cunning?

Great political strategist? There are thousands of beautiful women who couldn't pull that off if they'd had 8 years of college training in it.

First turn on for me is wit and cleverness and, when applicable, being a head of state.

PB

[liontamer]

47. Just goes to show that intelligent, confident men prefer intelligent, confident women. n/t

[Deep13]

6. That was the WORST looking Egyptian monarch I've seen since...

... Ahmenhotep III. I'm just being honest. (Egyptian Idol TV show.)

[AlCzervik]

7. .......

:spray: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

i wish i could nominate a post, you'd get my vote.

[WI_DEM]

9. Damn!! You mean she didn't look like Elizabeth Taylor?

[Bonhomme Richard]

10. I did hear she had a great Asp. n/t

[dogday]

11. To Be Honest, I cannot tell which side is Anthony

and which side is Cleopatra....

On edit thanks to # 27 for pointing that out...

[spoony]

14. I can't either

lol. In any case, I don't think ancient Egyptian artists were much for realism. Unless those dog-headed fellows really looked like that :P

[WCGreen]

27. It's not JC it's Anthony....

[devilgrrl]

12. Shit, I always thought she looked like this...

[cloudbase]

13. Generally,

what are considered "standards" of beauty change from era to era.

[devilgrrl]

17. Remember when women like this were all the rage?

[Swamp Rat]

21. The Three Graces are beautiful

:loveya: ... to me and Paul Rubens. :)

[XemaSab]

49. They're still all the rage!

That's what I see every time I look in a mirror. No lie. :P

[Leopolds Ghost]

15. "She looks as if she's forgotten to put her teeth in" - The British are extremely fucking shallow

And not one to talk about teeth.

What, exactly, is wrong with the woman in this image?

What'd be interesting is to know if she wore Greek fashions or classical Egyptian ones, and if she was dark-skinned or the product of 120 years of Greek inbreeding.

Besides, as they say "It's the nose"...

[Bridget Burke]

22. Guess the Brits just expect all Royals to be good looking....

[BreweryYardRat]

48. A couple hundred years of Ptolemaic inbreeding.

Cleopatra's ancestors were Macedonians, and they preserved the bloodline by incest (adopted at some point after the first few Ptolemies from the old traditions of their Egyptian subjects) in many, many cases. She probably had light skin and red or brown hair.

[originalpckelly]

16. Who knew Linda Tripp was related to Cleopatra?

:shrug:

[Swamp Rat]

19. I doubt if she looked anything like that coin.

All the coin shows is what the coin maker saw in his mind, and the level of sophistication of minting coins at that time.

Maybe that is what the coin maker and his wife looked like at the time of the minting?

Maybe his grandma posed for the flip side?

[etherealtruth]

24. Even if she looked exactly like the coin ...

I think that it is likely the standards of beauty differed from those of 20/21st century white Americans:shrug:

[XemaSab]

50. I dunno...

most of the old paintings and sculptures look pretty good to me. :shrug:

[bleedingheart]

31. it is doubtful the moldmaker ever had a look at her.

[alittlelark]

20. No coin is dated 32BC... It didn't exist!

BC is 'Before Christ'.... were they psychic????

[jobycom]

29. The coin doesn't say "32 BC," that's when historians date it. nt

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

25. Mark Antony loks like Kirk Douglas. -nt

[npincus]

28. I didn't know Ann Coulter was that old?

[bleedingheart]

30. 2000 years later and the men are still picking away at her because

she was a powerful woman...

[LibertyLover]

32. As one of my classmates at the Oriental Institute

once explained all the press Cleopatra got about her looks: "She was good with her mouth." 'Nuff said.

[Deep13]

37. Roman coin minter:

"We'll use generic female coin profile #6. That's close enough."

[kitkat65]

40. "When Shakespeare wrote . . . 'beggar'd all description', he meant

that words could not sum up her beauty."

Er, I guess we now know why?

:shrug:

[Evoman]

41. You don't have to be good looking to be seductive.

Everything I have read about Cleopatra has shown her as a shrewd, intelligent women who knew how to "play the game". Even in our shallow world, a person who understands seduction can put someone under their spell, despite their looks.

[InvisibleTouch]

42. I didn't think either one of those images on the coin...

...was particularly ugly. Hard to really tell from such a small and weathered piece, in any case.

[UTUSN]

43. Picture thread!!1 Uh, sorry, been dipping into da Lounge lately!!1

[rasputin1952]

44. Cleo was intelligent and cunning, that is for certain, as for how she

looked, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Romans were not known to especially "handsome" or "beautiful", but they were certainly ruthless conquerors. Thinking that they could bring about a Rome/Egypt dynasty would have certainly been on their minds...and the politics involved plays a very heavy role in this whole situation.

I'm sure Cleo was trying to save what she could as well, she did a pretty good job of separating Anthony and Julius by being amorous to both and using the power she could get from that interesting position.

As CatWoman said above, women were used to gain power and to breed new kings/caesars/emperors etc. Those who have great power relinquish it only under the most dire of circumstances, especially back then.

It should be said as well that powerful women draw men to them...power is certainly an aphrodisiac.

As for her looks from my personal viewpoint, I see nothing "beautiful" about her, but I would have liked to have been close enough to make sure I could share in some of the wealth, just so I wouldn't be a slave or menial worker for the landed gentry. When I got a little money together, I'd be out of there before I could tick someone off...:D Life was cheap back then, (it still is in some quarters), and I wouldn't want to lose my head because of a whim...:(

[onager]

45. Thank you, and greetings from Cleopatra's hometown...

Alexandria, Egypt. Where I've spent more than a year and a half now on a "temporary" work assignment.

The Graeco-Roman Museum here in Alexandria has quite a few coins showing Cleopatra, just as depicted in that article. According to the Museum, those coins are considered very accurate depictions because they were minted during her reign. And therefore had to be approved by her personally.

The Museum also has a statue believed to be Cleopatra, dancing in a religious festival dressed as Isis. She's depicted with a mysterious half-smile like the Mona Lisa.

Some more Cleopatra trivia, off the top of my alleged head:

Most people know about "Cleopatra's Needles," the two obelisks currently decorating Central Park in New York City and The Embankment in London. (The Egyptians would like to have them back, thank you very much.)

Since they came from Alexandria, naturally they have absolutely nothing to do with Cleopatra. Just as Alexandria's famous landmark Pompey's Pillar has nothing to do with Pompey and no Caesar ever camped in the area of Alexandria known as Caesar's Camp. (The whole city is like this.)

For several centuries, Cleopatra's Needles stood on the beach, near the current site of the Hotel Cecil. Well, one Needle stood, anyhow. The other one just lay in the sand. The Hotel Cecil was built in 1929 and made famous by Lawrence Durrell in The You-Know-What Quartet. The restaurant nearby where Durrell had his first date with Eve Cohen is still in business but no longer has a bar. Dammit.

The Hotel Cecil has a neat Cleopatra Connection. It claims that she killed herself on the hotel's front steps. The hotel might not be too far wrong. The hotel is located right beside the former site of the Caesarium, the temple Cleopatra built in honor of Mark Antony...and named for her son by Julius Caesar.

Alternative history fans might like to try this one on for size. Cleopatra had a son by Julius Caesar and two daughters by Mark Antony. Imagine what would have happened if, following the traditions of both the Egyptians and the Ptolemys, those kids had grown up and started a dynasty by intermarrying. The son of Julius Caesar and Cleopatra married to a daughter of Antony and Cleopatra. Jeez, the whole WORLD might be ruled by Egypt today...

Cleopatra's Needles were given to America and Great Britain by the famous 18th-century Egyptian ruler Mohammad Ali. Only he wasn't Egyptian at all, naturally, and most Egyptians today describe him as "that Albanian mercenary." Egypt was ruled by foreigners for about two and a half millenia, until the 1952 Revolution, if you've ever wondered why they're a mite touchy about the whole nationalism thing.

Dissing foreign invaders is an ancient and fun Egyptian tradition. Ancient Greek architects may have designed Alexandria, but it was built by Egyptian laborers--just like the Great Pyramids and (for the most part) the Suez Canal. According to one neat story, the Egyptians saw Alexander The Great as just one more foreign tourist, and refused to use the name "Alexandria" for the city. They simply called it "the building site."

It's funny that Cleopatra is probably the most famous Egyptian name except for Tutankhamen, since that name is not Egyptian at all but Greek. Well, OK, Macedonian. Alexander The Great had a younger sister named Cleopatra, who lived about 3 centuries before Cleopara VII ruled Egypt. On her wedding day, her father Phillip II of Macedon was assassinated. Her life was all downhill from there, and she was eventually killed in the general gorefest unleashed by Alexander's successors after his death.

If you want to see Cleopatra's palace in Alexandria, you'll need scuba gear. It washed away, along with the entire Royal Quarter of the city, in a massive tsunami during the Fourth Century CE.

You can see the spot where she allegedly had a smaller palace, on a little island in Montazah Gardens in eastern Alexandria. King Farouk built a teahouse on the same spot. Cleopatra's alleged palace couldn't have been much smaller than that damn teahouse.

Or as one guidebook said about the National Jewelry Museum, housed in a rococo monstrosity of a palace built by one of Farouk's sisters and featuring such necessities as diamond-studded fans: "Visit this museum and you'll see why Egypt needed a revolution."

[Lisa]

46. and I thought it was just my imagination!

A while ago, I purchased a cast of a coin (a Roman denarius) that showed Marc Anthony on one side, and Cleopatra on the other. I was embarrassed by the fact that I could not tell them apart, until the seller told me that she was the one wearing the diadem!



(by the way, for people who are concerned about stolen antiquities, or who like me just don't have the cash to buy the real things, this place has some rather good replicas)
http://www.dorchesters.com/coins/roman_coins_type_denarius2.htm

[XemaSab]

51. What I see when I look at that coin

is a coinmaker without a lot of artistic skill. They're sort of cartoony pictures, with the same nose and jawline.

It would be just as accurate to portray them as Bart and Lisa, or Charlie Brown and Lucy. :P

[FredScuttle]

54. Huh?

BLACK IS BEAUTIFUL, BABY!