Book your ticket to happiness with Sun Express Airlines. This is a series,

on the world, I'm John Bachelor with Berry Strauss, the author, the professor,

Berry Strauss, the Beomer, chair of Humanistic Studies at Cornell University,

and the author of several books now telling the story of

the Roman Empire and its predecease in the Greek Empire, the Macedonian Empire,

and what is to become of all of these memories of the first

great empire of the Mediterranean basin.

The book is the war that made the Roman Empire.

We're talking about the Naval Battle of Actium. However, Antinek Cleopatra and Octavian are the

contestants. There are other players here. We need to introduce Cleopatra.

Barry Cleopatra enters on a barge, a spectacular presentation

celebrated by poets and Shakespeare and everyone, of course,

to wow Antony at Tarsis. Her entry to Caesar

wowed him. Who was Cleopatra? Where did she get these skills bare?

So Cleopatra was the Queen of Egypt and she was a member of the dynasty of the

Ptolemy's. Ptolemy had been one of Alexander the Great's generals and after Alexander died

Ptolemy took over Egypt and turned it into his own personal kingdom and

Ptolemy and his successors turned Egypt into one of the great states of the ancient world.

They built a new capital city called Alexandria, which at the time of our story was the greatest city of the ancient Mediterranean. It was the great

metropolis. It had the most magnificent buildings. It had the greatest

cultural infrastructure of the Mediterranean world. The Ptolemy's also at their height had been the greatest naval power. the Alexandria is a teeming port it is very wealthy the trade of the world the ancient world comes to

around Alexandria at least as far east as India and as far west as Western Europe and Cleopatra is the Queen of this country. She's come up the hard way.

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