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Cleopatra (69 BC-30 BC), the last Pharaoh of Egypt and the third daughter Ptolemy XII Auletes, is one of the most mysterious people in ancient history, so compelling and mysterious that myths and legends abound about her to this day. Not much is known about her early life but her later conquests became the fodder for countless movies and books. Some portray her as a majestic seductress and others portray her as a bloodthirsty killer; oftentimes both. There is truth to these renditions of her.

Michael Klein details the careers of these fascinating women and explores how many important events they were instrumental in. With thorough research, Cleopatra and Nefertiti: Beyond Their Beauty and Seduction will open your eyes to the strength and audacity of these two queens.

In this historical essay, freelance writer Gerald Everett Jones correlates the few details known about the death of the last Greek-speaking philosopher with the religious and political revolution that overtook her. Jones explains how, centuries earlier, Egyptian priest Manetho and Greek mystic Timotheus created the cult of Sarapis at the behest of Pharaoh Ptolemy Soter.

Includes descriptions of 20 important artifacts, including the Sphinx, the Rosetta Stone, King Tut's funerary mask, and many more Africa may have given rise to the first human beings. And Egypt probably gave rise to the first great civilizations, which continue to fascinate modern societies across the globe nearly 5,000 years later.

What is often referred to as Egyptian mythology is actually a collection of all myths that existed in ancient Egypt. Call them myths or beliefs - these were an important part of ancient Egyptian religion and described the actions of the many gods and goddesses.

A sudden increase in attacks on caravans, along with the delay of the Nubian tillage, sees Shabaka and Neti travel to Shabaka's home, Sylene, where they are tasked with finding the royal shutty. On their arrival they find not only that an attempt has been made on Dagi's life but also that his death has been foretold by the most unlikeliest practitioner of divine arts.

The youngest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World also turned out to be the most practical and one of the longest lived, surviving into the late Middle Ages. It was a lighthouse built on the northern coast of Egypt, in Africa, at the Greek city founded in Alexander's name. It was the Pharos, the Great Lighthouse of Alexandria. Among antiquity's wonders, the Lighthouse of Alexandria was fairly unique in terms of both its purpose and its secular nature.

For centuries in the Western world, during what is known as the Middle Ages, written knowledge was guarded closely and hidden away in private repositories, usually by the religious classes. The lack of libraries in the West has helped contribute to the popular imagination of the ancient Library at Alexandria and all the myths and legends that have come to be associated with it, but the Library of Alexandria deserves its reputation.

On the Salisbury Plain, only a few hours from the hustle and bustle of Central London, remains one of the greatest surviving relics of humanity's ancient past: the mighty stone circle of Stonehenge. Stonehenge is one of the most well-known ancient sites in the world, and an image of it raises numerous associations and emotional responses.

When scholars study the history of the ancient Near East, several wars that had extremely brutal consequences (at least by modern standards) often stand out. Forced removal of entire populations, sieges that decimated entire cities, and wanton destruction of property were all tactics used by the various peoples of the ancient Near East against each other, but the Assyrians were the first people to make war a science.

The lack of libraries in the West helped contribute to the popular imagination of the ancient Library at Alexandria, and all the myths and legends that have come to be associated with it, but the Library of Alexandria deserves its reputation. While the exact nature of the Library remains murky, it functioned for at least several centuries and is believed to have housed hundreds of thousands of books, most written as scrolls on papyrus, and it essentially became the culmination of two ancient literary and cultural traditions converging.

Today, the term "Philistine" is often used as a euphemism for a person who is particularly uncouth, uncultured, ignorant, and possibly violent. Most people probably do not know the etymology of the word when they use it, and those that do probably only know the Philistines as villains from the Old Testament who were the eternal enemies of the Hebrews prior to and immediately after the latter formed the kingdom of Israel.

Every era has watershed moments that shape the arc of history, and for Ancient Rome, few were as decisive or monumental as the Battle of Actium in 31 B.C. The battle's importance is understandable given the stakes and people involved; Actium pitted the joint navies of Cleopatra and Mark Antony against the battle fleet of Octavian. In many ways, this climactic battle was the culmination of a years-long power struggle between the heirs of the assassinated Julius Caesar, with Octavian being his legally appointed heir and Antony being his longtime lieutenant and trusted advisor.

This is the saga of the Hittite King Suppiluliumas, and rings with authenticity and the passion of a world that existed 1400 years before the birth of Christ. They called him Great King, Favorite of the Storm God, the Valiant. He conquered more than forty nations and brought fear and war to the very doorstep of 18th Dynasty Egypt, but he could not conquer the one woman he truly loved.

The mere mention of his name, Tutankhamun, brings to mind visions of gold and splendor and thoughts of a majestic kingdom. The reality of this king is something quite different. His fame has less to do with his position in history and nearly everything to do with the discovery of his tomb by Howard Carter in 1922. There are many questions and mysteries still surrounding this famous king of Egypt. Who was Tutankhamun? Where did he come from? What was his kingdom like? How did he live and die?

In the early 20th century, over 3,000 years after her death, Nefertiti became a household name and one of the most famous women of the ancient world. Egyptologists were aware that she was a queen of the New Kingdom Egypt during the later portion of the 18th dynasty, but she was little-known until the presentation of a reconstructed bust depicting her at the Berlin Museum in 1924. Nefertiti means "the beautiful one has come", and if the presented bust is anything to judge by she, was indeed a beautiful woman.

Nearly 2,000 years ago, two ancient writers named Antipater of Sidon and Philo of Byzantium authored antiquity's most well-known tour guides. After the two Greeks had traveled around the Mediterranean, they wrote of what they considered to be the classical world's greatest construction projects. While there is still some question as to who actually authored the text attributed to Philo and Antipater at the time of its creation, their lists ended up comprising the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

The Hittites are an ancient people who remain somewhat enigmatic, but their influence on the ancient Near East is undeniable. From high in their capital of Hattusa in central Anatolia, the Hittites were able to conquer and control a kingdom that roughly comprised the area of modern Turkey, Syria, and parts of Iraq and Lebanon through a combination of brute military force and shrewd diplomatic machinations.

The life story of Ramesses II is voluminously recorded and illustrated through documents and inscriptions, and it is even represented physically through his funerary goods and the well-preserved mummified remains of the man himself. But despite the resources available with which to reason about who Ramesses II was and what his impact might have been, there is also a necessary disconnection between him and those who chronicled his story.

Until about 200 years ago, the writing of the ancient Egyptians was an enigma to the world, but that changed when an ancient Egyptian monument known today as the Rosetta Stone was discovered (or rediscovered serendipitously) by French soldiers in Egypt in 1799. Now one of the most famous monuments in the world, the Rosetta Stone is a black granite stela that was inscribed with texts in Greek and two different scripts of the ancient Egyptian language: demotic and hieroglyphs.