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00:0029th of August 30 BC the Egyptian city of Alexandria a 17 year old boy is running
00:16through the streets pursued by assassins he was born to rule an empire but his
00:26people will not help him his army has deserted him and his mother has taken her
00:37own life he does not know it yet but this teenager will be the last Pharaoh of
00:46ancient Egypt a 19-day reign that will bring to an end 3,000 years of history
00:55ancient Egypt the Roman Empire
01:14the Aztecs of Mexico
01:19and the samurai of Japan
01:24for great civilizations each a pinnacle of human ingenuity and achievement each
01:35lasted for centuries their people thought they would endure forever until suddenly
01:46everything changed
01:50these civilizations faced challenges that are all too familiar today
01:59climate catastrophe
02:05pandemic
02:10challenges for which ancient societies had few solutions
02:22but what if there was a place that had the answers to what went wrong a place full of secrets and stories
02:37the British Museum home to more than eight million artifacts is a record of how and why the greatest civilizations rose to power and then spectacularly fell
02:44its treasures are the human traces of how and why the greatest civilizations rose to power and the greatest civilizations rose to power and then spectacularly fell
02:51its treasures are the human traces that survived disaster
03:06but might they also hold lessons for our own future
03:12every civilization throughout history has had an expiry date
03:19every civilization throughout history has had an expiry date
03:21with great societies the seeds of their destruction are sown within the society
03:27they're already there
03:29they're already there
03:30no civilization ever thinks it's going to fall
03:36but the question is what can we learn from the past
03:42by the first century BC ancient Egypt has thrived for three millennia
04:01ancient Egypt is the jewel in the crown of ancient
04:12ancient history it's wealthy it's got 3,000 years of the most spectacular history
04:19it's monumental buildings it's phenomenal culture and it was the country all others aspired to be
04:29it had it all
04:35Egypt is advanced architecturally they've built amazing temples and of course the pyramids
04:42and on top of that there are huge advances in writing and in medicine as well
04:50the natural resources of this land have allowed the Egyptians to build a vast and powerful kingdom stretching from the Mediterranean deep into Africa
05:02the secret to Egypt's success is its unique river the Nile
05:15the great bounty of the river Nile allows Egypt to become the bread basket of the ancient world
05:21because each year when the rains fall in the summer up in the Ethiopian highlands it causes a great rush of water
05:29down the Nile and that causes the river to flood its banks and it brings water and nutrients to the fields
05:36it enables the super abundance of grain
05:41this is the currency that the world economy depends upon and Egypt has this in huge quantities
05:48grain provides Egypt with vast wealth and power making it the first nation state in history
05:55it is led by a single all-powerful ruler the Pharaoh
06:03one jewel of the British Museum's Egypt collection is a grand monument to the most famous Pharaoh of them all
06:24?
06:31?
06:42?
06:45?
06:46?
06:46?
06:47?
06:48?
06:49?
06:50?
06:51far and wide, unifying his diverse subjects with a singular vision.
06:59This is a surviving fragment of a 23-foot statue that struck awe and wonder into all
07:08who saw it, and played a vital role in uniting his people behind him.
07:15The eyes are slightly tilted downwards, so when you're looking up, you've got this powerful
07:21feeling that Ramses is looking down on you.
07:26This really gives you a real sense of majesty and dominance.
07:32On Ramses' crown is his royal symbol, a deadly snake, the cobra.
07:39It reveals the secret behind the pharaoh's absolute power.
07:46For the Egyptians, you have a leader who is the king, but the Egyptian king is someone
07:51who is not just a human.
07:54When you see the cobra on the forehead of anyone, it means that they are divine.
08:01The king, or the pharaoh, was a sort of god on earth.
08:05He was supposed to enter into a contract with the gods and make sure the gods were appeased,
08:11and therefore he was both the ruler as well as a deity.
08:15And this gave him special privileges and powers.
08:25Egypt thrives when its people unite behind their god-king, but this is a challenge for the latest pharaohs.
08:34A thousand years after Ramses II, a new dynasty rules.
08:58The Ptolemies.
09:01The Ptolemies are, without doubt, the most violent royal dynasty that there's ever been.
09:10The Ptolemies are not Egyptian, but Greek, successors of Alexander the Great, who conquered
09:18Egypt and built one of the grandest cities of the ancient world, Alexandria.
09:27To begin with, the Ptolemies build a strong economy and a thriving society.
09:34But after 200 years, there are signs that their riches and successes have gone to their heads.
09:44This is a family that over several generations has been tearing itself apart, vying for ultimate control of Egypt.
09:53Like any situation where great wealth or great power is at stake, it is fertile breeding ground for rivalry.
10:02In the days of Ramses, pharaohs represented permanence and invincibility, but under the Ptolemies, chaos now reigns.
10:11This is a sandstone stela, a monument.
10:30Traditionally, the name of the ruling pharaoh would be inscribed into the stone in an oval symbol called a cartouche.
10:47But this stela is different.
10:54We get, in this period, examples of blank cartouches.
10:58The cartouches usually contain the pharaoh's name, but in the records, we find many hundreds of examples of blank cartouches.
11:08They've never been filled in. The artist hasn't even tried to fill it in.
11:12The turnover of pharaohs has become so rapid that the stonemasons are reluctant to carve the name of a specific Ptolemaic pharaoh,
11:26because who knows, you know, in five minutes' time, this name might be no more and we'd have to carve it out and rewrite it.
11:34Brothers have been at war with brothers. Husbands have been at war with their wives.
11:42One had his own son killed, and the body part sent to the boy's mother on the eve of her birthday celebration.
11:50So this gives you a bit of a sense of the kind of blood-spattered nature of the Ptolemaic royal family.
11:57Dynasties are a pressure cooker, and the people who are the top dynasty tend to become corrupted by power.
12:07We now have ample evidence from neuroscience and psychology that people's brains seem to change once they get a hold of power.
12:15This is a recipe for disaster.
12:18It's 51 BC, and Pharaoh Ptolemy XII lies dying. His reign has been dominated by infighting. He has squandered Egypt's wealth and territory to preserve his power. He is about to hand this poisoned chalice to his successor.
12:44Ptolemy XII has five kids and is looking to them to pave the way for the survival of the dynasty. But that shows a chronic lack of self-awareness about dynastic politics and the family that he has bred.
13:07Of his five children, his formidable 18-year-old daughter seems the obvious choice to succeed him. Her name is Cleopatra.
13:19I think it's fair to say that Cleopatra is very much her father's favourite child. She has a brilliant mind, a great intellect. She was a superb politician. But she's also very, very ruthless. She could manipulate those around her quite brilliantly.
13:41And that quality of ruthless ambition is something Ptolemy has deliberately encouraged.
13:48Great family dynasties, whether you're talking about Murdoch, the Hurst family, Rockefeller, the means by which the head of the dynasty keeps control is by making sure they all understand that, you know, they can be up but they can come down again.
14:15In a sense, he's encouraged division. He's encouraged ambition. He has created a ready-made battlefield that's going to explode.
14:30Ptolemy does have a male heir. Also called Ptolemy, but he is only 11 and too young to rule.
14:45Their father insists that brother and sister join forces and become joint pharaohs by marrying each other.
14:56Of course she does not want to marry her brother.
14:59Cleopatra is a headstrong young woman who was well-versed in statecraft. So why would she want to share the throne?
15:09She was astute enough to know that this was a power struggle waiting to happen and she wanted to nip it in the bud.
15:15When her father dies, Cleopatra makes her move. But she inherits a deeply divided society.
15:32The Ptolemies have promoted a Greek elite and they expect a male ruler.
15:41Egypt is a difficult country to rule. There are tensions between the indigenous population and the Greek settlers.
15:47By this time, the Egyptians feel that they are towards the lower end of the hierarchy.
15:59That the best jobs are actually reserved for the Greek population.
16:08We could see Egypt as a kind of tinderbox.
16:11She tries to appease the Egyptian people.
16:19Cleopatra knows that the people's support can be the tipping point in her infighting with her brother.
16:26Cleopatra believes if she can get the Egyptians on side, the Greeks will have to follow.
16:45So she embarks on an audacious campaign.
16:48The pharaohs have always claimed to be divine.
16:53But Cleopatra takes it one step further.
16:57Cleopatra refers to herself as a goddess.
17:02The new Isis or Isis personified.
17:06The great mother goddess.
17:09The bringer of fertility.
17:10The bringer of wealth.
17:11By Cleopatra's time, Isis has absorbed all the powers of all the collective goddesses of Egypt.
17:25So she is the ultimate deity.
17:30She is pretty much everywhere.
17:32She is pretty much everywhere.
17:33She is on the walls of temples.
17:35And with some of these statuettes and figurines, these are often put in domestic buildings.
17:41So she is the ultimate deity.
17:44So people could worship Isis at home.
17:59Everybody literally loved Isis.
18:04This is a stunning sculpture representing the nurturing aspect of the mother goddess Isis.
18:09aspect of the mother goddess Isis. She's gently raising her hand towards her breast,
18:15which means that she was about to breastfeed her son.
18:19Now, if we look closer to her hair, that's probably my favourite bit. She's wearing
18:27a vulture headdress and every single feather is detailed in dark blue.
18:35In ancient Egypt, Isis is the ultimate symbol of motherhood, protection, magic, but also
18:41of divine rulership.
18:58By identifying herself with Isis, Cleopatra is really saying to the Egyptians, I am your
19:03living goddess. I will protect you as Isis protects you. The tears of Isis give you the
19:09Nile. I am Isis. I give you the Nile. I give you life. I give you protection. I give you
19:15fertility. It was a very sensible political ploy.
19:20So, when Cleopatra puts it out there that she actually is a goddess, part of you might
19:27think, well, that's absurd and it's just a piece of spin, dare I say. But actually, we
19:34quite like the idea of thinking there's somebody out there that we can trust to lead us in a
19:41certain direction.
19:49She may be winning over the Egyptian people, but Cleopatra also needs allies with real power.
19:59She looks to her forefathers for inspiration. Who did they turn to to secure their crown?
20:06The Resetta Stone is important to us.
20:19The Resetta Stone is so important to us if 972 got a great feeling or we can see her
20:26residues behind the battlefield.
20:27That is what toolboxes have in Him.
20:33The Rosetta Stone is so important to us as Egyptologists
20:37because on this hunk of granite you have hieroglyphs,
20:41Egyptian, Domotic and Greek written.
20:47The Rosetta Stone, a magical key that allowed 19th century historians
20:53to decode hieroglyphs for the very first time.
20:57But the Rosetta Stone is more than just a translation device.
21:03The words written on it explain one of Cleopatra's most important decisions.
21:13When the Rosetta Stone was written there was an uprising
21:16and the Ptolemies were struggling to maintain control.
21:19And so the Rosetta Stone really is a document that tells us
21:24what the Ptolemies did to solve this problem.
21:26The Ptolemies really have to get the Egyptian priests on side.
21:33The priests are very influential figures
21:35amongst the native Egyptian population.
21:37On the face of it, it's a simple contract
21:40between the priests of Egypt and the royal family.
21:45The early Ptolemies made a deal.
21:48They gave priests tax breaks and land.
21:51In return, the priests decreed that the Ptolemies were god-kings
21:57who must be faithfully followed.
21:59Cleopatra strikes the same deal, lavishly funding temples and enriching the priests.
22:14In return, they proclaim her sole pharaoh.
22:20And she rules unopposed for 18 months.
22:23But not everyone accepts the new status quo.
22:29While Cleopatra was winning the hearts and minds of the Egyptians and of the priests,
22:36she left one thing out of the equation.
22:39Because her brother went off and got the Greek elites and the military on his side.
22:45But Cleopatra and her brother, Ptolemy XIII, are playing with fire.
22:55The population, rather than being unified by a single belief in the pharaoh,
23:00is instead divided upon multiple ethnic lines.
23:04Different ethnic and ideological groups can become fault lines across society.
23:09This makes society by nature far more fragile.
23:12Cleopatra has the loyalty of the people, but Ptolemy has control of Egypt's mighty army.
23:35As his forces approach Alexandria, Cleopatra flees the country.
23:40But she will not accept defeat.
23:45We're talking about Cleopatra here.
23:49She was born to rule. She was trained to rule. She was a goddess and a queen.
23:56So she was not going to let that little sniveling brat take over.
24:00And so she was going to come back and fight for what was hers.
24:05Desperate to reclaim her throne, she takes a monumental gamble.
24:23And turns to a superpower even mightier than her own.
24:27The unstoppable rising force of Rome.
24:32The Romans are probably the most warlike society on earth.
24:39Its great deity is Mars, the god of war.
24:46Rome was stampeding its way across the Mediterranean.
24:55Their tactics are swift and bloody and brutal.
25:01That's what it was all about for them was to expand the idea of Romanitas.
25:10Being Roman and creating a civilized world out of that.
25:16It would be a very dangerous thing for Cleopatra to get Rome on her side.
25:22Because of course she has to be able to A convince the Romans that she is the right ruler.
25:27And B hold Rome in check so that they don't swallow her up.
25:32There's a potential here for Rome, as dangerous as it is, to actually be the saviour of Cleopatra.
25:42But getting into bed with the devil is a dangerous thing.
25:54If fortune favours the bold, this is Cleopatra's moment to be fearless.
26:00The legendary Roman general, Julius Caesar, is passing through Egypt on a military campaign.
26:17So she smuggles herself back into the country, risking her own life in order to meet the man she hopes will save her.
26:28It is always challenging for a woman to be a ruler, or it has been in the past few thousand years.
26:34And this was obviously something that Cleopatra had to struggle with.
26:39I think the biggest problem was getting military might immediately behind her.
26:44Cleopatra was very astute politically, and she knew that she could use other gifts in her arsenal.
26:53Her charm, her wit, her humour, her wealth, and even her body.
26:59I think that this is where all of that charisma of the woman comes out.
27:09This kind of magic that she works in terms of conversation and intellect.
27:15Julia Caesar, he's smitten, he's absolutely smitten with her.
27:23I think it's a great meeting of minds.
27:27But also, there's a lot of sexual energy in the room too.
27:32Cleopatra had few options as to what she could do, and this was indeed a gamble.
27:40But nothing ventured, nothing gained, and a die is cast.
27:45With Caesar's support, she now has the might of Rome on her side.
27:49But Cleopatra and her brother have unleashed the dark forces of division in Egypt.
27:58Within a matter of weeks, outright civil war breaks out.
28:06This is very serious.
28:08This is politics turning against the people and against the things they hold most dear.
28:14This infighting that happens among the Ptolemies does affect people's daily life.
28:21People who had been living in relative tolerance with one another, suddenly they have to pick sides.
28:29The violence boils over into Alexandria as Cleopatra's forces set light to her brother Ptolemy's ships.
28:38A devastating fire sweeps across the city, destroying its treasures.
28:44What's going through Cleopatra's head as the library of Alexandria that her ancestors built and that was the pride of her city is in flames.
28:56They had set the task for the first librarian to collect every book in the world.
29:03Now thousands of books are burnt and lots of homes are destroyed.
29:09The irony to a large extent is that what's at stake isn't as great as that.
29:16It's a sibling rivalry. It's not worth the damage that's taking place.
29:21Alexandria never recovers.
29:25This is a huge tragedy for Egypt and indeed for humanity.
29:30I think leaders often find it difficult to separate out their own interests and the national interest and they can persuade themselves that the two are one and the same thing.
29:45And it leads to levels of brutality and ruthlessness.
29:50And I think once that happens, it is dangerous.
29:54The Romans proved too powerful for Ptolemy XIII.
29:58He is hopelessly outnumbered and outflanked.
30:01At the age of just 15, he drowns, fleeing Caesar's troops.
30:08Cleopatra's brother is gone.
30:10Restored as pharaoh, Cleopatra must now heal the divisions of civil war.
30:38But family feuds and infighting have ravaged Egypt's economy.
30:47More than ever, she must rely on the bounty of the Nile.
30:52But seismic events 6,000 miles away are about to plunge Egypt deeper into chaos.
31:00There is a large eruption in Alaska, of all places.
31:12In fact, the largest volcanic eruption in the last two and a half thousand years in the northern hemisphere.
31:17So this is a very big eruption.
31:21What we've learned in the last couple of years is that very large volcanic eruptions can impact the East African monsoon, which drives the Nile flood that hits Egypt every year.
31:35Egypt is dependent on the annual flood of the river.
31:40And when that goes wrong, when it's weak or there's no flood, then things are really bad.
31:46This climate disaster leads to food shortages.
31:54And Egypt's grain exports come to a halt.
31:58Cleopatra has to resort to desperate measures to keep her country afloat.
32:03Cleopatra has to resort to desperate measures to keep her country afloat.
32:33The Egyptian economy is in real sharp decline at this point.
32:43Cleopatra has to respond economically as best she can.
32:48Her extreme measures are revealed in these coins of father and daughter, minted only 20 years apart.
33:03The economic crises are coming thick and fast.
33:06And what do rulers throughout history do when they're faced with economic crisis?
33:10Well, they devalue the currency, they debase the coinage.
33:15There are two coins.
33:18One of Ptolemy XII.
33:21The other of Cleopatra.
33:24You can see significant changes already in the silver content.
33:28The coin of Ptolemy XII has about 90% silver content. It's larger.
33:35The coin of Cleopatra is about 30% silver content and it's smaller.
33:42But it tells a really important story of the drop-off of the Ptolemaic economy between Ptolemy XII and Cleopatra.
33:50Within just 20 years, the value of Egypt's currency plummets by nearly 70%.
34:00She is faced with a whole array of issues which no ruler on earth could have solved.
34:07To make matters worse, the floods fail to return for almost 10 years.
34:13Food reserves are gone and mass famine breaks out.
34:17Cleopatra has to use all the emergency stocks of grain that the Egyptian government hold.
34:25And she depletes the treasury in order to feed her people.
34:30And it really, a combination of those things, essentially bankrupts Egypt.
34:38Broken and starving, the people lose trust in their pharaoh.
34:42And there is evidence that Cleopatra's subjects place their faith elsewhere.
34:52They turn in increasing numbers to worshipping animal gods.
35:06They turn in increasing numbers to worshipping animal gods.
35:21This is Sobek.
35:25Egypt's god of fertility.
35:27This crocodile mummy is fantastic.
35:33Even though I've seen hundreds of them, I still get a frisson because each one is different.
35:39To see Sobek, we are actually in the presence of the divine.
35:43It's extraordinary for us to be able to see a living god from Egypt 2,000 plus years later.
35:53It's about 4 meters plus long and it's very much blackened because it's got this resinous black goo on it.
36:02And what's really cool is on the back there are babies that are stuck to the back.
36:06There were temples dedicated to the crocodile god, so the young crocodiles were brought in, put in the sacred pools.
36:18They were given a very luxurious lifestyle and they were literally treated like the gods that they were assumed to be.
36:25During the Ptolemaic era, the number of animal mummies is mind-boggling.
36:34At one site, we have 8 million dogs, 2 million ibises.
36:40You have hundreds and thousands of baboons.
36:46This upsurge is an indication that things are not okay, things are awry.
36:51Like everyone else in this world, when it is a time of crisis and the rulers are not doing their job, you turn to the gods.
37:01The pharaoh, who once promoted herself as the all-powerful goddess Isis, is losing her grip.
37:21It's a very difficult moment when a pharaoh fails because the pharaoh is the incarnation of the gods.
37:26Something has gone wrong in the cosmic setup of the world.
37:35There are calls in the south of Egypt to break off from the rest of Egypt.
37:41Certainly the Ptolemaic dynasty is hanging by a thread.
37:45Time is running out for the Ptolemies.
37:54But unlike her male predecessors, Cleopatra has an ace that only she can play.
38:02She can play.
38:32Nine months after Cleopatra and Julius Caesar were first holed up together in the royal palace, she gives birth to a son.
38:50He has the blood of Rome and the blood of Egypt flowing in his veins.
38:59And she thinks, if I can unite the military might of Rome with Egypt, this is an unstoppable force.
39:07So she really thinks that this is not the end of a dynasty, but the beginning of a great new chapter in the Egyptian story.
39:17On this sandstone monument, Cleopatra proclaims that her son will forge a new empire, one that can feed its people and restore its fortune.
39:32A winged sun and a scarab beetle represent the dawn of a new golden age.
39:45Gifts are offered to Egypt's fertility gods, including Sobek and Isis.
39:55And Cleopatra's son is shown as the new pharaoh.
39:59He will be known by his Roman nickname, Caesarian, or Little Caesar.
40:09This would be a startling new world, unparalleled, unmapped, uncharted, unstoppable.
40:20If the plan works, not only do the problems of Egypt get solved,
40:24but Egypt regains a position as a superpower.
40:34For her strategy to work, Cleopatra must get the Romans to also embrace Caesarian as their future leader.
40:41But events outpace her.
40:47In Rome, Julius Caesar is brutally murdered before he declares his heir.
40:54The assassination of Julius Caesar comes as a hammer blow to Cleopatra.
41:10Not only on the most personal level, I think she genuinely loved him.
41:14But of course, it brought a swift end to her political ambitions as well.
41:21All that came crashing down in one foul day.
41:27A lesser ruler might now accept defeat, but not Cleopatra.
41:45After one of her sisters plots against her,
41:49Cleopatra uses the opportunity to wipe out any possible opposition.
41:54Power can be like a drug, and once you're hooked on it, very, very, very hard to give up.
42:04Because you can't really see life beyond it.
42:09Over the next three years, she murders all her remaining siblings.
42:14There's a sort of moral corruption that power can do to people.
42:23You certainly see it having sometimes a very corrosive psychological impact on people.
42:29You are prepared to do anything, anything, to stay in power and to meet your objectives,
42:35up to and including killing people.
42:41The Ptolemy line will continue, but only on Cleopatra's terms.
42:46She now needs to form a new alliance with Rome.
43:06So she looks to the men who take Caesar's place.
43:12Two candidates emerge.
43:15Caesar's nephew, Octavian, takes control of the Western Roman world.
43:22He sees himself as Caesar's rightful heir, so will never accept Cleopatra's son.
43:27But there's also the general who takes control of Rome's vast eastern territories.
43:37Mark Antony.
43:42And so she casts her eye on Mark Antony to do the kind of work that she needed to be done.
43:49Mark Antony was, to his core, a squaddie.
44:04You know, he was a rough Roman soldier, heavy drinking, heavy womanising,
44:10living for pleasure and living to fight.
44:13She clearly recognised that Antony was not a deep thinker,
44:16that he was impulsive, that he was easily persuaded.
44:22He was open to flattery, that's for sure.
44:40And so she plays this brilliant political game.
44:43She knows what she wants and she's able to attract those to her side to support her vision of almost like the takeover of the ancient world.
44:53She was so magnetic in her charm, her ability to understand what makes the male ego tick, to flatter them.
45:08And that is a heady mix that no one could ever resist.
45:13Mark Antony is besotted.
45:14Mark Antony is besotted.
45:15He abandons his Roman wife and sets up home with Cleopatra.
45:16Mark Antony is besotted.
45:17He abandons his Roman wife and sets up home with Cleopatra.
45:18Throwing his weight behind her plan for an adorable family,
45:20throwing his weight behind her plan for an adventure.
45:21Mark Antony is besotted.
45:23Mark Antony is besotted.
45:24Mark Antony is besotted.
45:26Mark Antony is besotted.
45:40He abandons his Roman wife and sets up home with Cleopatra, throwing his weight behind
45:47her plan for an Egypto-Roman empire, ruled by the now 13-year-old Caesarian.
45:56This culminates in a spectacular ceremony called the Donations of Alexandria.
46:04This was not merely a coronation, but a politically provocative event to strengthen their rule
46:10in the east.
46:14And there in front of all of the Alexandrians and ambassadors from different states around
46:21the Mediterranean, Mark Antony doles out the lands of the Eastern Roman Empire to Cleopatra
46:31and her heirs.
46:32And he says that all of these lands belonging to the east of Rome will be in perpetuity inherited
46:44by Cleopatra and Caesarian.
46:52So there is a real possibility at this moment that Cleopatra and Caesarian could become the
46:59rulers of a vast empire.
47:05But when news of the ceremony reaches Octavian, Mark Antony's rival back in Rome, he is outraged.
47:18He refuses to allow Roman lands to be broken up and given away.
47:26Antony and Cleopatra had so much power at their disposal, the only weapons Octavian had to throw
47:32at them was to ridicule them.
47:36Octavian starts a smear campaign to destroy Cleopatra and Antony's credibility and turn all Romans
47:44against them.
47:51Now this fragmentary marble relief is fascinating.
47:59It shows Mark Antony and Cleopatra engaged in what's euphemistically called a sexual act on a boat.
48:11It's a symbol of how some in the Roman world, certainly Mark Antony's enemies, saw how he was
48:20being manipulated by this harlot queen of Egypt.
48:25Octavian creates multiple pieces of propaganda like this, to destroy Cleopatra's reputation,
48:34and play on fears that Egypt might one day overshadow Rome.
48:42Where her allure and beauty were once part of Cleopatra's armory as a leader, now they are used to attack her.
48:54And so they're using this as a sort of crowbar to sort of prize apart the two worlds.
49:01And this relief really brings that idea to the fore, to use ridicule and misogyny to undermine one's enemies.
49:12Octavian's plan works, and the Romans turn against Mark Antony and Cleopatra.
49:31But things have gone too far for her to back down now.
49:38There are times when it looks like she has Egypt's best interest at heart.
49:42There are other times when her decisions appear to suggest that she's only really interested
49:47in holding on to power.
49:52This is absolutely an all or nothing gamble for Cleopatra.
49:57If she wins, she re-establishes the Ptolemaic dynasty in all its former glory.
50:06If she loses, well, all bets are off.
50:11Octavian declares war and his fleet sets sail.
50:17On the 2nd of September, 31 BC, Cleopatra and Mark Antony face Octavian in a legendary naval battle
50:39of the coast of the coast of Greece at Actium.
50:50One extraordinary witness to what happened that day still survives.
50:56This fitting belongs to a boat which participated to the famous Battle of Actium in 31 BC.
51:05It is made of leaded copper. You can see it's highly corroded and encrusted with sea creatures.
51:25Emerging from the medallion at the front of this prowl is this beautiful figure of Athena,
51:35the goddess of strategy, war and wisdom.
51:38Now this is the goddess you want leading your fleet into battle.
51:44Believing the gods are on her side, Cleopatra has every reason to be confident.
51:51She has the numbers too.
51:55Antony and Cleopatra's fleet of ships, there were about 230 of them.
52:01There were about 150 Roman ships in this.
52:05So, on the face of it, the Egyptians really outnumbered the Romans.
52:11But Cleopatra makes an epic miscalculation.
52:15She lets her fleet be pushed back towards the coast.
52:19The Egyptian fleet was essentially being hemmed in and the Romans moved their fleet closer and closer.
52:27And essentially the Egyptians were trapped. They couldn't get out of it at all.
52:32Octavian then unleashes burning oil and tar.
52:38An inferno breaks out across the Egyptian navy.
52:43Cleopatra and Mark Antony know the game is up.
52:48They make their escape, abandoning their fleet.
52:52Including the ship this prowl once served.
52:57It becomes a burnt, battered witness to a monumental defeat.
53:21Her navy decimated. Her treasury depleted. And her political legitimacy shattered.
53:30Cleopatra barricades herself with Mark Antony inside their royal quarters.
53:36While Octavian's triumphant army marches into Egypt.
53:43It all ends badly.
53:46Antony knew the way in which Roman traitors were treated.
53:53And he knew that a spectacle of death awaited him.
53:59So, he took his life to avoid the dishonor of a traitor's death in Rome.
54:06He is taken to Cleopatra who weeps over his body and then gives him a proper decent burial.
54:13But then she then realizes, of course, the only option would be for Octavian to march her into Rome in chains, humiliated.
54:22And she was not having any of it.
54:25Cleopatra takes a venomous asp and lets it bite her.
54:30This cobra, once the symbol of unassailable Egyptian royal power, in her hands becomes an instrument of death.
54:42Even to the end, Cleopatra is mistress of her own destiny.
54:51Octavian instructs his forces to hunt down Cleopatra's heir, Caesarean.
54:57The fate of Egypt now rests in the hands of its 17-year-old pharaoh.
55:12But who will come to his aid?
55:16Decades of the most dysfunctional family in world history had caused a complete disconnect with much of Egypt.
55:31The Egyptians have been through a lot in terms of civil wars and famines.
55:37The people probably knew it was the beginning of the end for the Egypt they knew.
55:44Lacking both military and popular support, Caesarean is abandoned to his fate.
55:52He is murdered by Octavian's troops.
56:02It is the last moment of a 3,000-year-old empire.
56:09And the end of the Egyptian pharaohs.
56:13For three millennia, Egypt thrived, united behind its mighty pharaoh.
56:23But the dysfunctional dynasty of the Ptolemies, with their vicious infighting, tore this once great civilisation apart.
56:34Had the Ptolemies been less inclined to pursue short-term power gains, ancient Egyptian pharaonic values would still be alive and well today.
56:47But I think the number of Ptolemies who sought to just benefit themselves, I think that's what destabilised things ultimately.
56:56In their desperation to cling on to power at all costs, the Ptolemies forgot what it was to rule and left Egypt vulnerable and fatally exposed.
57:11Cleopatra, in the end, was undermined by a perfect storm.
57:16Warfare, now flood failure, political instability, Rome threatening her.
57:23On top of which, a shock of a volcanic eruption.
57:27And there are many people today who rightly suggest that we should be on the lookout for a perfect storm event.
57:36I think it's a lesson to learn from Cleopatra's time and what happened to her.
57:41Countries can rise. They can have a standing and a reputation in the world that is huge.
57:50And it can go. And it can fall.
57:55And I don't think we should ever think that we're immune.
57:58The Aztecs, one of the most remarkable civilisations in history, faces an unimaginable threat.
58:13As old world meets new.
58:17And a ruthless leader struggles to save his empire from powerful new enemies.
58:24And I think we're behind it.
58:36The four planets are all likely to have this bosom and fuercy.
58:42This is the easiest way to keep smelling and become scary.
58:45And to the producers of Masters and Heroes always marvel and enjoy taking hated
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