The Last Dynasty
Ancient Egypt from Alexander the Great to Cleopatra
-
-
4.0 • 5 Ratings
-
-
- $19.99
Publisher Description
One of the world’s leading Egyptologists tells the rich and fascinating story of ancient Egypt’s last dynasty.
Alexander the Great and Cleopatra may be two of the most famous figures from the ancient world, but the Egyptian era bookended by their lives—the Ptolemaic period (305–30 BC)—is little known. In The Last Dynasty, New York Times best-selling author Toby Wilkinson unravels the incredible story of this turbulent era, bringing to life three centuries’ worth of extraordinary moments and charismatic figures.
Macedonian in origin and Greek-speaking, the Ptolemies presided over the final flourishing of pharaonic civilization. Wilkinson describes the extraordinary cultural reach displayed at the height of their power: how they founded new cities, including Alexandria, their great seaside residence and commercial capital; mined gold in the furthest reaches of Nubia; built spectacular new temples that are among the foremost architectural wonders of the Nile Valley; and created a dazzling civilization that produced astonishing works of sculpture, architecture, and literature. Stunningly, he also shows how such expansionist ambitions led to the era’s downfall. The Ptolemaic period was a time when ancient Egypt turned its gaze westward—in the process becoming the unwitting handmaid to the inexorable rise of Rome and the consequent loss of Egyptian independence.
Featuring a superb blend of first-rate scholarship and evocative narrative history, The Last Dynasty provides fresh insights into this overlooked period of history and its legacy in shaping the world as we know it.
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.
