2023-04-21 00:37:43
The second season of ‘Queens of Africa’, a Netflix documentary series produced by Jada Pinkett Smith (Will Smith’s wife), deals with the life of the Egyptian Cleopatra, who is characterized as a black woman in contrast to all the actresses who have played her role on screen before, from Vivien Leigh in ‘Caesar and Cleopatra’ (1945) to Elizabeth Taylor in ‘Cleopatra’ (1963), going through Sophia Loren in ‘Cleopatra’s Nights’ (1954).
The choice of the British Adele James (‘Casualty’, ‘Doctors’), has been justified by Netflix as “a nod to the conversation that has been going on for centuries about the race of the ruler”, but the only thing that has served is to generate a great controversy in social networks and in Egypt itself. The former Minister of Antiquities Zahi Hawass has criticized in the newspaper ‘Al-Masry Al-Youm’ the decision and stated that “Netflix is trying to cause confusion by spreading false and misleading facts that the origin of Egyptian civilization is black.” Non-conforming, in the country of the pyramids, a lawyer named Mahmoud al Semary has filed a complaint with a prosecutor to block access to Netflix services in Egypt for being “promoting Afrocentric thought (…) that includes slogans and writings intended to distort and erase Egyptian identity.”
It is quite common to hear that Cleopatra would not be considered a physically attractive person today because her Egyptian beauty, with a huge nose, does not conform to modern standards. And yes, for the Greek historian Plutarch, did not possess a beauty “such as to astonish all who saw it; but her interaction with her was enthralling, and her appearance, coupled with her ability to persuade in colloquy and the temperament with which she accompanied each exchange, was highly stimulating. She also gave pleasure with the tone of her voice, because her tongue was like an instrument with several strings ».
But whether she was ugly or beautiful, the basic ruling is to consider Cleopatra, whose name means ‘glory of his father‘, as a representative woman of the current Egyptian world. The most famous Egyptian in history was, like her family, of Macedonian blood and represented a racial and cultural minority in the African country. Despite the miscegenation that included a Greco-Egyptian hybrid religion, a gulf existed between the culture of the people and that of their foreign rulers.
a greek empire
Far from the glorious centuries in which the pyramids were built, Alexander the Great wrested Egypt from the Persians in 331 BC. C and one of his favorite generals, Ptolemy, born in Macedonia, managed to establish his own empire here on the death of the conqueror. during the call War of the Diadochi (or the Successors), the generals of the conquerors faced each other in a brutal conflict, where three dynasties managed to perpetuate themselves over time: the one founded by Ptolemy in Egypt, the one established by Antigonus and his son in Greece, and the one planted by Seleucus. in the heart of Asia until its destruction by the Romans centuries later.
The Ptolemaic dynasty He ruled Egypt for almost three centuries during which he turned his capital, Alexandria, into a populous and cosmopolitan city mixing African, Greek, Hebrew, Roman and Nubian culture. The wisest of the Mediterranean world made a pilgrimage to the city to study in el Mouseion, the first academy in the world and consult its famous great library. In Alexandria, Aristarchus postulated a first theory on the heliocentric solar system and Eratosthenes calculated the earth’s circumference, also the Hebrew Bible was translated into Greek for the first time.
Roman sculpture of Cleopatra wearing a royal diadem, mid-1st century BCE. c.
When Julius Caesar arrived in the land of the pharaohs, he found himself immersed in the fight for the throne between Cleopatra VII and Ptolemy XIII, both brothers and husbands. Very little is known about Cleopatra’s physical appearance, although she did have white skin because she mentions it in a poem, but much about her intelligence. She was the first of her dynasty to know the Egyptian language and to soak herself in it, despite his Hellenistic trainingin the local culture. He did it, above all, for political reasons and to gain popular support in his dispute for the throne. In addition to being a brilliant diplomat, she was considered a woman educated in many fields and the author of several medical treatises.
The pharaoh knew how to attract Julius Caesar to her bed and was able to recover the throne with his help, so that Ptolemy XIII was eliminated from the equation. Even so, Cleopatra, who lived halfway between East and West, also knew how to survive the murder of her protector. With mark antony, one of Julius Caesar’s generals, would live a new love story that would lead to another Greek tragedy. At his death, Egypt would become one more province of Rome.
The theory about Cleopatra’s black skin color found an ally in 2009 Sally-Ann Ashton, an Egyptologist at the University of Cambridge, who set out to reconstruct the pharaoh’s features based on the few sculptures and reproductions of decorations from various temples in Dendera, a town located west of the Nile River, as well as on preserved coin engravings. The resulting description was a woman 1.52 meters tall, with brown skin, slightly overweight, a large nose and very thin lips. For her critics, the only problem with the Egyptologist’s work is that she did not take into account that political representations do not usually reflect the true appearance, but rather what she wanted to project at a public level. Imitating local traits could be, as she did when learning the language, one more way to ingratiate herself with the population.
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