고대 이집트여왕 크레오파트라. The Book of Cleopatra, by Claude Ferval

고대 이집트여왕 크레오파트라. The Book of Cleopatra, by Claude Ferval
크레오파트라. The Book of Cleopatra, by Claude Ferval
FOREWORD
Cleopatra, that curiously perverse figure, that incarnation of fatal passion, what was she
like? A combination of pride and frailty, adored and despised. Plutarch said that "Her charm
entered into men's very souls," and Horace thanked the gods for delivering the earth from that
"Fatale Monstrum."
It is not the gigantic outlines graven on the dusty walls of the temple at Dendera that will
reveal the mystery of Cleopatra; nor yet those bronze medals from Syracuse, with their curious
hieratic profiles; disguised by these gross images who would recognize the intelligence, the
passion, the daring, the flame, the storm, the witchery, that were united in that "serpent of old
Nile"?
If only some masterpiece of Greek sculpture had been preserved! If we possessed that
statue made at Cæsar's orders by the sculptor, Timomachus! or that cherished treasure which a
rich citizen of Alexandria offered Cæsar Augustus two thousand talents to leave untouched!
But all these portraits have disappeared.
Poor as we are in material we can only divine what she really was in appearance and in
character. It is not certain that she was beautiful, at least not of that sensuous type of beauty
which has been generally attributed to her. But, if tradition which has come down the ages has
any weight, with her burning mouth, her radiant eyes, her slender body, which her country's
fiery sun had polished till it shone like gilded marble, what creature born of woman was ever
more fitted to inspire delight and adoration?
"The kings who crossed her threshold died from excess of love."
But physical beauty alone could not have so ensnared and deprived of reason such
warriors as Cæsar and Antony, brave, indefatigable, honourable men, who fell at her feet,
forgetting duty, honour, the very memory of their country, for love of her.
We must look further. Her rare intellect, which made her every word of interest; her
incomparable, magnetic charm, which banished ennui and held her listeners enthralled; her
ardent, passionate nature; these have made her peerless among the fascinators of the world,
Circe, Delilah, Heloise, Yseult, Carmen, Sirens or Walkyrie―living women, or creatures of
the poets' fancy―all the enchantresses who have driven men to madness have had the one gift
in common, that of arousing passion, stirring emotion, fanning the flame of love.