Cleopatra’s Regal Arrival at Tarsus

She worked to stabilize the economy, reform the grain supply (vital to both Egypt and Rome),

and strengthen the navy. But Egypt’s autonomy remained precarious. The Roman Republic

had fractured into a Second Triumvirate—Octavian, Mark Antony, and Lepidus—and control of the East

fell to Antony. In 41 BCE, he summoned Cleopatra to Tarsus to answer accusations that

she had aided his enemies. Rather than come as a defendant, she arrived as a

queen of divine stature. Plutarch describes her barge as “like a floating palace,”

its stern gilded, its sails purple-dyed (a color reserved for royalty), oarsmen rowing to

the sound of flutes and lyres.