The Cleopatras – Part 4: The last Cleopatras

The 50-odd-year period that stretched from the death of Cleopatra III to the rise of Cleopatra VII was Egypt’s period of terminal decline. In 101 BC, the feckless Ptolemy X Alexander I, having murdered his co-regent mother Cleopatra III, sat on the throne, generally disliked by everyone, especially the Romans who regarded him as a corpulent waste of space. The one thing Ptolemy X had in his favour was his brilliant young niece-wife Cleopatra V Berenice III, who was the antidote to Ptolemy’s ineptitude. A relief depicting a Ptolemaic queen or possibly goddess from the Musée du Louvre. Image: Karl Harris Cleopatra V Berenice III Very little evidence has survived about the nature