2 ms·

Cleopatra was a Greek, wasn't she?

• thaumasiotes 4y ago
  Yes. There are complexities there too; she was an offshoot of the Ptolemaic dynasty established by one of Alexander the Great's generals. One of the diplomatic triumphs of Philip II (Alexander's father) was getting the rest of Greece to allow Macedon to participate in the "panhellenic" ["all Greece"] Olympic games. So roughly 400 years before Cleopatra's time, the more southern Greeks would have turned up their noses at her claim to be Greek. (Though in that case, the Macedonian language was quite obviously a variety of Greek, whereas the Greek and Egyptian languages were completely unrelated.)