The Last Dynasty
Ancient Egypt from Alexander the Great to Cleopatra
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- $27.99
Publisher Description
'A truly splendid read, richly detailed and powered by an unfailing gift for storytelling' John Guy
'Superb and gripping' Simon Sebag Montefiore
A definitive and thrilling new account of the last great dynasty of ancient Egypt, from Alexander the Great to Cleopatra.
When Alexander the Great arrived in Egypt, he overthrew the hated Persian overlords and was welcomed as a saviour. He repaid them by showing due reverence to their long-held traditions. After his death, as the Greek empire broke up and his closest advisers squabbled over the spoils, a Macedonian general named Ptolemy seized the Egyptian throne, ushering in a new dynasty that would last for 300 years.
What followed was as dramatic and compelling as any period in Egyptian history. The unique blend of Greek and Egyptian cultures led to an unprecedented flowering of learning, as the new city of Alexandria became home to the Great Library, the largest in the ancient world, that attracted the brightest minds. Wars, incest, double-dealing, foreign empires and huge wealth all followed, but the rise of the Roman empire would eventually bring the Ptolemaic era crashing to a close.
Helped by the latest archaeological discoveries and using original papyrus documents, Toby Wilkinson uncovers a story that can only now be fully told. From courtly life to the role of women, from international trade to the tensions between native Egyptians and incoming Greeks, all aspects of life are here. Filled with surprising insights, vivid descriptions and larger-than-life characters, and written in the author's compelling narrative style, The Last Dynasty will appeal to all lovers of history, archaeology, art and culture.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Egypt goes from glory to disaster in this lively history of the Ptolemaic Dynasty. Egyptologist Wilkinson (Ramesses the Great) begins with Alexander the Great's conquest of Egypt in 332 BCE and continues through the reigns of his general Ptolemy, successive Ptolemies II through XV, and various queens culminating with Cleopatra VII, who almost restored the family's fortunes with her canny manipulation of Caesar and Mark Antony. The first four Ptolemies oversaw a golden age, in Wilkinson's telling, as Egypt grew rich on abundant Nile Valley grain and made territorial conquests. The wealthy Ptolemaic capital at Alexandria had the world's greatest library and academy, where Euclid developed geometry and Eratosthenes calculated the Earth's circumference, but later wars eroded the overextended empire and necessitated high taxes that ruined farmers and sparked revolts. Wilkinson gives an entertaining account of the royal family's violent rivalries and melodramas—made crazier by the tradition of brothers marrying sisters—along with deeper takes on the religious roots of power (the Ptolemies routinely had themselves declared gods) and the lives of ordinary Egyptians resentful of the Greek-speaking upper class. (One outraged Greek settler, Wilkinson notes, wrote to Pharaoh complaining of an Egyptian woman who doused him with urine and spat in his face.) It's an insightful interpretation of one of the ancient world's great civilizations.
