Cleopatra was white and I can prove it

[Roma_Victrix]

Right it was her escape to Syria and raising the mercenary army that I was referring to, her army encamped at Pelusium after all. I think Cleopatra's voyage to Hermanthis she would have been accompanied by her brother and most of the court. It was certainly a formal state event rather than a casual event. Not sure about the voyage with Caesar down the Nile, it sounds anecdotal but who knows. Cleopatra was kind of the exception because her state visits to Rome were mandatory. Just as her father was required to travel to Rome and stay there, waiting and lobbying for the support of the Senate. Sight seeing and state wide inspections weren't really on the agenda.

By her brother do you mean her youngest Ptolemy XIV? Because Ptolemy XIII was in Alexandria when she went to Hermonthis. It gave Ptolemy XIII (or really his slimy handler and eunuch tutor Potheinos) the opportunity to screw her over by diverting all the grain shipments to Alexandria on pain of death, denying them to other regions of Egypt to deliberately cause unrest and undercut the support she had from the native Egyptians, particularly the wealthy native Egyptian priesthood. To be honest I don't know what Ptolemy XIV was doing at the time, as he was incredibly young at that point in 51 BC.

Indeed, I agree. Besides her travels around Egypt, she had in her disposal the whole Alexandria Library, where the Pyramids were listed as one of the wonders. I doubt that she wasn't aware of Sphinx as well.

I am not aware of a "n-word" in koine Greek as well. In medieval Greek and European languages the word gypsy derives from "Egyptian" because they thought that these people originated there. The ancient Greek word for "black" people is "Αιθίοψ-Αιθίοπας" /"Ethiops" like modern day Ethiopia which means "looking "black" literally looking like being covered with soot"

I thought as much! The etymological history of the "N-word" in English and other present-day spoken languages goes back no earlier than the Early Modern period, as far as I know. It did not exist in the Middle Ages, let alone Antiquity, when English was nonexistent. I most heavily doubt that Cleopatra would have referred to Egyptians as "Ethiops", because the Greeks of Ptolemaic Egypt and for that matter the Greeks in general made a clear distinction between native ethnic Egyptians and "Ethiopians" (which could have referred to anyone from that part of East Africa, stretching from Nubia in what is now Sudan to ancient Eritrea along the Red Sea, along with Ethiopia itself and perhaps even Somalia in the Horn of Africa).

[Lord Oda Nobunaga]

I don't know. I read in a source that she was accompanied by her brother Ptolemy XIII and the court. Maybe Potheinus was left behind and did it? I could be wrong. Would have to find the exact page, not sure if it was Stanley Burstein though.

Really don't know what to say about the N-word thing. What might be the meaning is that Alexandrians (Greeks in other words) regarded the Egyptians as being lesser than they were. There was definitely an enforced social class whereby the Greeks were the dominant people. The Egyptians were regarded with suspicion in that they were seen as the feral majority. For all of the high upper class Egyptians that managed to make it in this society there must have been ten times more who were practically serfs.

[neoptolemos]

I thought as much! The etymological history of the "N-word" in English and other present-day spoken languages goes back no earlier than the Early Modern period, as far as I know. It did not exist in the Middle Ages, let alone Antiquity, when English was nonexistent. I most heavily doubt that Cleopatra would have referred to Egyptians as "Ethiops", because the Greeks of Ptolemaic Egypt and for that matter the Greeks in general made a clear distinction between native ethnic Egyptians and "Ethiopians" (which could have referred to anyone from that part of East Africa, stretching from Nubia in what is now Sudan to ancient Eritrea along the Red Sea, along with Ethiopia itself and perhaps even Somalia in the Horn of Africa).

And you are correct. Ancient Greeks never referred to Egyptians as "Ethiopes" and they had a documented relationship spanning some centuries.
In modern Greek though one of the words for "black" people ,"Arapis" comes from the Turkish "arap" which simple means Arab. Go figure......
https://el.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%B...80%CE%B7%CF%82

Also this is interesting

Although ostensibly ethnic labels were at times used by individuals in reference to themselves in legal documents, it is hard to define what such labels actually meant to those involved and whether they served any purpose outside the legal sphere. In other words, were such labels, when used, purely legal terms or did this reflect a broader ethnic category applying to an individual in all circumstances and thus with possible effects on their daily life? The evidence suggests that the latter was not the case, at least not in the Ptolemaic period.³⁴ As Goudriaan points out, Preaux observed that "we do not have knowledge of any juridical definition of `Egyptians' in use during the Ptolemaic epoch," but this "did not prevent the inhabitants of Egypt from mutually labeling their compatriots in ethnical terms; in other words what we might call a social definition of `Egyptian' and `Hellene' did exist and function."³⁵ Hellenes and Egyptians were not classes, nor professional groups nor were they distinguished by status.³⁶ It would also seem to be difficult to distinguish who exactly was "Hellene" or "Egyptian," as "nomenclature proved to be a wholly unreliable guide for establishing the ethnic identity of the persons mentioned in our sources, and this conclusion is valid from the end of the third Century BC onwards."³⁷ Under the Romans the issue of "ethnic identity" is somewhat different, due to their division of society into classes based on distinctions between Romans, Greeks, and Egyptians (various levels of citizenship of the Empire), at least until AD 212 when Caracalla extended Roman citizenship to almost every inhabitant of the Empire.³⁸

From the example of Apollonia and her daughters it would appear that the same person (i.e. man or woman) could conduct business in either Greek or Demotic. This causes one to ask, how did a person choose which language to use and why? Was a document treated differently depending on the language in which it was written, or was it merely a matter of an administrative difference, i.e. that it was treated the same way, but went to a different office to be dealt with by administrators who could read that particular language (after having been registered and summarized in Greek)? Or were all documents dealt with in the same office regardless of the language they were written in? In other words, did this represent a social or legal difference? According to the Amnesty Decree of Ptolemy VIII and the two Cleopatras of 118 BC, documents written in Egyptian were dealt with by Egyptian courts, i.e. according to Egyptian law, whereas documents written in Greek were dealt with in Greek courts.³⁹ In the case of Greek law a woman would need a kyrios (guardian) to act on her behalf,⁴⁰ and for Apollonia with a husband who may have been away much of the time,⁴¹ this requirement might have proved problematic. Thus she conducted business in Demotic as, not needing to have to find a man to act as her guardian, it must have been more convenient to operate within that legal system.⁴² It appears then, that a woman with access to both, chose that which was more advantageous to her.⁴³

https://oi.uchicago.edu/research/res...-ptolemaic-a-0

[Roma_Victrix]

I don't know. I read in a source that she was accompanied by her brother Ptolemy XIII and the court. Maybe Potheinus was left behind and did it? I could be wrong. Would have to find the exact page, not sure if it was Stanley Burstein though.

If you find it, do let us know. I'd be surprised about it, though, because from what I remember her brother did not accompany her on this particular journey. The reason I believe it would have been Ptolemy XIV instead was the fact that Cleopatra attempted an early alliance with him shortly after the falling out with her other brother Ptolemy XIII.

Really don't know what to say about the N-word thing. What might be the meaning is that Alexandrians (Greeks in other words) regarded the Egyptians as being lesser than they were. There was definitely an enforced social class whereby the Greeks were the dominant people. The Egyptians were regarded with suspicion in that they were seen as the feral majority. For all of the high upper class Egyptians that managed to make it in this society there must have been ten times more who were practically serfs.

Basically, yes. The Egyptian priesthood and merchant class were fat and happy with their lot in life, but the vast majority of Egyptians were rural peasants, and a great number of them after that were urban poor. The rural peasants were indeed obligated by Ptolemaic law to stay in their villages during the planting and harvesting seasons. That's basically serfdom, although I think other forms such as Early Modern Russian serfdom were more extreme. The Egyptians did okay for themselves generally speaking, but if they lived or traveled to one of the Greek poleis such as Alexandria (or Naukratis, or Ptolemais Hermiou) they were suddenly governed by different laws (as if stepping into a different country, albeit still in Egypt) that excluded and segregated them from the Greeks living in their own residential quarters. They weren't allowed to marry said Greeks and weren't even really allowed to mingle with them at the gymnasium either. Outside of this handful of Greek poleis, though, the Egyptians were governed by a much laxer set of laws that did allow them to interact and intermarry with Greeks and any other peoples of their choosing. One must think of Alexandria as a city-state, then, one that was not technically part of Egypt but still the capital of the Ptolemaic Empire that once stretched into the Aegean and included hefty portions of the Levant at certain times.

And you are correct. Ancient Greeks never referred to Egyptians as "Ethiopes" and they had a documented relationship spanning some centuries.
In modern Greek though one of the words for "black" people ,"Arapis" comes from the Turkish "arap" which simple means Arab. Go figure......
https://el.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%B...80%CE%B7%CF%82

Also this is interesting
https://oi.uchicago.edu/research/res...-ptolemaic-a-0

Thanks for sharing and for confirming my inclinations and beliefs.

[Ludicus]

I doubt that she wasn't aware of Sphinx as well.

That's not what I said.
Thinking about it - regarding Cleopatra's physical appearance -I have some doubts about Cleopatra's pure witness. Her mother was probably a member of the Egyptian family of Ptah.This means a half Egyptian mother. It's well know that Cleopatra (unlike any of her predecessors) spoke the Egyptian language. Think about this, why was Cleopatra the only Ptolemy to speak Egyptian? why?
It's more than probably that Cleopatra wasn't pure white Macedonian.
And again, as someone put it, it is unlikely that Cleopatra cared about her racial makeup and the "purity" of her blood.
It's a strange obsession in our modern world...

[athanaric]

Thinking about it - regarding Cleopatra's physical appearance -I have some doubts about Cleopatra's pure witness. Her mother was probably a member of the Egyptian family of Ptah.This means a half Egyptian mother. It's well know that Cleopatra (unlike any of her predecessors) spoke the Egyptian language. Think about this, why was Cleopatra the only Ptolemy to speak Egyptian? why?
It's more than probably that Cleopatra wasn't pure white Macedonian.
And again, as someone put it, it is unlikely that Cleopatra cared about her racial makeup and the "purity" of her blood.
It's a strange obsession in our modern world...

It's like you didn't read anything in this thread. Everything you just said has already been debunked at least once on previous pages. All you're doing is generating traffic for a thread with a clickbait title, and spreading misinformation.

[Roma_Victrix]

It's like you didn't read anything in this thread. Everything you just said has already been debunked at least once on previous pages. All you're doing is generating traffic for a thread with a clickbait title, and spreading misinformation.

Yes, it is admittedly clickbait. Guilty as charged.

That's not what I said.
Thinking about it - regarding Cleopatra's physical appearance -I have some doubts about Cleopatra's pure witness. Her mother was probably a member of the Egyptian family of Ptah.This means a half Egyptian mother. It's well know that Cleopatra (unlike any of her predecessors) spoke the Egyptian language. Think about this, why was Cleopatra the only Ptolemy to speak Egyptian? why?
It's more than probably that Cleopatra wasn't pure white Macedonian.
And again, as someone put it, it is unlikely that Cleopatra cared about her racial makeup and the "purity" of her blood.
It's a strange obsession in our modern world...

This theory that Cleopatra's mother could have belonged to the priestly family of Ptah has been mentioned in this thread before and discussed at length. Didn't think it would rise again, but just to reiterate:

(1) Cleopatra didn't just speak Egyptian, though, she spoke a number of foreign languages that reflected her territorial ambitions. Learning Egyptian was just one way to connect with the greater amount of her subjects now that the once extensive Ptolemaic Empire (at one point stretching into the Aegean Sea) had been reduced to only Egypt and Cyprus.
(2) Under Ptolemaic law, it was literally illegal for Greeks to marry Egyptian husbands/wives in the Greek city-states of Alexandria, Naukratis, and Ptolemais Hermiou. If Cleopatra's father had taken on an Egyptian woman to produce royal heirs, this would have caused an enormous scandal and it would be shocking if it didn't feature later in Octavian's propaganda campaign against Cleopatra and Mark Antony (which is also curiously silent about her being an allegedly illegitimate bastard daughter, which only Strabo contended was the case; no other historian mentions this).
(3) Cleopatra had a half-Macedonian half-Egyptian half-cousin serving as the High Priest of Ptah, but that branch of her family didn't produce any royal heirs and were never given the chance to do so with Cleopatra's fall and Egypt's conquest by the Roman Republic under Octavian. There is not a shred of evidence this worked the other way around, that members of the priestly family of Ptah married into the royal family to become potential claimants to the throne. Again, that would have been an enormous event and no ancient historian worth his salt would have ignored it back then, as it would have been the scandal of the decade.
(4) There is only one known instance of a native ethnic Egyptian mistress taken by a Ptolemaic pharaoh, but she did not produce any royal heirs. It is assumed that the rest of them were ethnically Greek/Macedonian.
(5) The Greeks didn't have a concept of race, but they were cultural xenophobes. They wouldn't have accepted an Egyptian mistress producing royal heirs, but they also wouldn't have accepted other types of European women either, including Thracians, Illyrians, or Galatian Celts who inhabited Ptolemaic Egypt. At most a Greek/Macedonian mistress would have been chosen. Viewed from the marriage practices of the Ptolemies as a whole, it was simply remarkable that Cleopatra chose Latin Roman men as her partners, those being Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, but she did so out of political expediency. That and the Romans, who controlled virtually the whole of the Mediterranean, were more or less honorary Greeks by that point and the Roman aristocracy spoke Koine Greek as if it was a second native language.

It is interesting to note that the Ptolemies practiced incest to keep pure royal bloodlines not as some sort of form of anachronistic racial purity, but because they were following the ancient Egyptian royal practice of sibling marriage. This came about as a result of the age-old Osiris Myth, in which Osiris conceived a child, Horus, with his sister-wife Isis, who brought him back to life after he was murdered by Set. When it wasn't possible or politically expedient to marry one's sister or husband, a Ptolemaic ruler would go to the next best thing in their view, a Greek/Macedonian mistress. It's quite a stretch to think they would turn to a native Egyptian one, though, because that was taboo among the Alexandrian Greeks, who were known for being riotous and willing to topple the rule of pharaohs who they did not like. Ptolemy XII Auletes, father of Cleopatra, was even kicked out of Egypt in such a riot in the capital, but that was over his financial policies and cowardly silence about his brother being killed in Cyprus, not because of some supposed Egyptian woman he was hypothetically diddling. Being a Ptolemaic ruler must have been like living in a constant Sword of Damocles situation.

[alhoon]

I haven't read much in this thread but... has anyone mentioned that Greeks are not white? We have the same color as Southern Italians, Spanish, Maltese, Arabs, Jews, Afghanis etc.

[Lord Oda Nobunaga]

I haven't read much in this thread but... has anyone mentioned that Greeks are not white? We have the same color as Southern Italians, Spanish, Maltese, Arabs, Jews, Afghanis etc.

Are you referring to melanin content? Populations in the Mediterranean do not differ that drastically when it comes to melanin content. There are families in Italy and Spain for example where children are born with sightly more melanin than some others. That doesn't fundamentally change their genetics.

I'm not sure what you mean by "White". But as Roma and myself and even Sumskilz a bit more indirectly have posted, there are incredibly light skinned Greeks and always have been. Also Spaniards, Jews and Italians aren't White?

yours truly

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

my dad

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

my grandad

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

It's like you didn't read anything in this thread. Everything you just said has already been debunked at least once on previous pages. All you're doing is generating traffic for a thread with a clickbait title, and spreading misinformation.

Well technically I haven't debunked Stanley Burstein... not yet anyway. Personally I strongly doubt that Cleopatra's mother was anyone but Cleopatra V. That is because all ancient sources mention that her mother was Cleopatra V. Also all of the monuments mention that Ptolemy's wife was a Cleopatra. If Cleopatra's mother was not Cleopatra V or VI and the Cleopatra name still survived on the monuments it sets a really bad image of Cleopatra's propagandist ability. If the source of the revolts against her by her family and the court were about her illegitimacy then why did she allow the name of the other kid's mothers to survive? Surely if that was the contention then she would have scratched out all the names, unless she left it there as a stand in for herself. Or Ptolemy's other wife was also called Cleopatra, assuming he had another wife since this is not mentioned anywhere. It just seems like a bunch of conjecture on the part of some of these historians.

[Roma_Victrix]

I haven't read much in this thread but... has anyone mentioned that Greeks are not white? We have the same color as Southern Italians, Spanish, Maltese, Arabs, Jews, Afghanis etc.

Your links do not demonstrate that and ironically enough the second link you shared has a map that contradicts exactly what you are trying to assert. In either case, every group you listed here is basically Caucasian if not "white", but let us not rely on the silly Anglo-Saxon view of whiteness, please. For a long time they didn't even consider Irish people to be white, which shows you how warped their view of things were. In either case the paintings in the OP depict a woman with light skin and just about any ancient painting of Macedonian Greeks shows roughly the same pigmentation. Are you suggesting the people in this ancient Macedonian Greek painting below are not white Europeans? The colors here are realistic and follow conventions of Classical Greek realism; it is not symbolic coloring like in most ancient Egyptian artwork.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/bb/7c...a4d7070126.jpg

[alhoon]

What? How can they say the Irish are not white? They are very pale.
When we say white, we go by melanin content, right?
Yes, there are some pale Greeks but there are many "light brown" Greeks and a few dark Greeks that are dark brown. White people with their blond hair that get red in the sun while we get a tan. Also, white people have "stronger stomachs" than us.

What I am suggesting is that my ancestors 2500 years ago were getting dark in the sun while the ancestors of the Irish and the Celts and who else was in the British islands and what much later became Germans or Dutch were getting red in the sun.
About that painting: Well, if the artist drew a British contemporary to those guys, the Brit would be much more pale. Thus, no, Greeks and Romans and Egyptians, and Jews etc were not White Europeans.
Also, even if the artist tried to portray the color of the skin carefully, how old is that painting?


Oda: Apologies but you and your father don't look white. Again, put your arm next to someone from Northern Europe and you will see what I mean.

About my link: It clearly states that
"Type III pigmentation is frequent among populations from parts of the Mediterranean, Asia, and Latin America.^[1][17][18] It ranges from olive^[2] to cream skin tones.^[19] This skin type sometimes mildly burns and tans gradually.^[19]Type IV pigmentation is frequent among populations from the Mediterranean, as well as parts of Asia and Latin America.^[3][20] It ranges from olive^[4] to moderate brown, typical Mediterranean skin tones. "

Greeks are Type III and a few are type IV. Whites are Type I, II and the veeery palest of III.
So yes, you could say that very few Greeks look white.
Except when the summer comes where our melanin superiority over the whites shows up as they run to cover their blistered skin.

[Lord Oda Nobunaga]

I mean... what is white according to you?

White?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

non-White?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[alhoon]

Obviously the 2nd is non-white. The 2nd guy is darker than many Greeks (Except in the summer and that's because most Greeks like to get a tan for some reason)

[Lord Oda Nobunaga]

Obviously? How is he non-White? Because he doesn't have blonde hair?

[Roma_Victrix]

What? How can they say the Irish are not white? They are very pale.

This is after the whole Protestant Reformation thing and rise of pseudo racial sciences in the 18th-19th centuries, combined with the Anglo-Saxon attitude that Protestants were somehow a different people from Catholics, which included the Irish, but also most Southern Europeans.

When we say white, we go by melanin content, right?
Yes, there are some pale Greeks but there are many "light brown" Greeks and a few dark Greeks that are dark brown. White people with their blond hair that get red in the sun while we get a tan. Also, white people have "stronger stomachs" than us.

Some Greeks are brown and olive skinned because the Mediterranean world has been that way in general since at least the Neolithic period, but this is also the period where light skin started to become predominant in Europe thanks to cereal-rich diets. Then came the wave of Indo-Europeans from the Pontic Steppe region in the late Bronze Age, including the ancestors of the Greeks (i.e. the proto-Greeks), which basically sealed the deal. In either case, skin tone and tanning isn't the only thing that determines if someone is Caucasian or not. This is about overall physiognomy as much as it is about skin color.

Reinforcing my point about the ancient Greeks, this is how the Romans viewed the penultimate Macedonian Greek Alexander the Great, in the Alexander Mosaic of Pompeii, circa 100 BC, most likely created at that point by an ethnic Greek artist of Magna Graecia under Roman dominion in southern Italy. If this is how the Greeks viewed themselves, then I fail to see any convincing argument that they were somehow not white/Caucasian. He looks like he would fit in to just about any modern population of Europeans.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...r_close_up.JPG

[alhoon]

Obviously? How is he non-White? Because he doesn't have blonde hair?

Because he doesn't have white skin, but brown skin... Also yes, because of the hair, but the first guy probably bleached them. I can't believe that blond could be natural to an adult.


Also another example: Diana and Juan Carlos



See how much darker Juan Carlos is that Diana?

About Alexander's portrait: Can't you see he is not white in there? He is even darker than Juan Carlos in the picture.

Also, I think we are Caucasian in "shape"... but white = color not shape and physiology. An albino Sudanese is white, not black. Not even brown. Probably an Albino Sudanese is paler than me (and I am very pale for a Greek).
And what Europeans have to do with how dark is one's skin color? Yes there are significant populations in Europe with such colors. Mainly Mediterraneans but we have moved a lot so you can find that everywhere.


What do you mean by "white"?
And I am still too stunned about the Irish to respond. They could have called the Irish something else if they wanted to be racists on them. But their skin is clearly white.

[Lord Oda Nobunaga]

The guy I posted was an Italian. He is likely descended from Lombardic peoples (or again could just be an Italian). He might have more melanin or he could just have a tan. But it doesn't really matter.

With regards to Irish not being "White" I think it is a different matter entirely. By Anglo-Saxon standards of that time half of France wouldn't be considered White. It was actually a Germanic centric view. But Alhoon's standards are seemingly not different.
Having Melanin doesn't make you non-White. By that logic plenty of people within White populations wouldn't be White. We know that the presence of melanin can occur naturally within a specific group of people (though usually not in high amounts).

Is this guy White? No? Well he is Welsh after all...


Is she White? No? Well she is Irish, ammaright guys?

[alhoon]

I totally fail at racism...

the sentence "Having Melanin doesn't make you non-White" sounds as absurd to me as a sentence of "being born by a human mother and father doesn't make you human".
I believe Melanin content is the very definition of what makes you white or not. Catherine JZ isn't white despite being born Irish to Irish fathers as your picture clearly shows.
I mean, this should not be hard... is she as white as that scale indicates? No? Then she's not white, she's light brown.

What about an albino Sudanese? Does he count as white, brown or black? I would count him as white.

I know a racist and he is less racist towards not-too-dark skinned people. And I don't mean "Geographic area average". I mean he looks down on dark Greeks and tries to not get a tan in the summer.

[Roma_Victrix]

Also another example: Diana and Juan Carlos



See how much darker Juan Carlos is that Diana?

No, I really don't. He looks like an average white European to me. He doesn't look radically different from Diana as you are suggesting. I could easily mistake him for just another British guy talking to her. Your definition of white is a strange one, I have to say. I'm starting to think you mean literal freakish paper-white instead of just various hues like beige and pink that virtually all Europeans have, to say nothing of North African, West Asian, and Central Asian Caucasian peoples.

About Alexander's portrait: Can't you see he is not white in there? He is even darker than Juan Carlos in the picture.

Again, what? Apparently you're looking at a different picture than the one I'm looking at. You seem to have some sort of strange definition of whiteness as being only milky ivory white. Most white people don't even look like that. Most "white" people have a beige or even pinkish hue to their skin. That's as true as it is for Scottish people as it is for Greeks and Afghans and Spaniards and Frenchmen and Tajiks and Russians, etc.

[Prodromos]

You are only white if you have pink nipples. Let's see your nipples, Oda.