Kleopatra of Alexandria (Queen of Egypt, 51 – 30 BCE)
Born 69 BCE. In On the Manufacture of Medicaments, G
(12.403–405, 432–434, 492–493 K.) records three of
Kleopatra’s recipes from the work she allegedly wrote On
Cosmetics (tò kosme ̄tikòn): for alo ̄pekia, for scalp rash, and a
mixture for hair loss. The last is also quoted, under Kleo-
patra’s name, in A A’s medical books (6.56:
CMG 8.2, p. 205), where a body unguent is added (8.6:
p. 408, with amo ̄mon, cassia, kostos, malabathron,
etc.). Gale ̄n expressly states (12.445–446 K.) that such
recipes were part of a collection of medicaments
assembled by K, from which he probably quoted
them.
In addition, an extract On Weights and Measures under
Kleopatra’s name has survived which claims to be drawn
from her work On Cosmetics. Basically a table, the extract
lists the average weight of mina and its submultiples, and of what and how many fractions
each of them is made. Eight measures for fluids are then displayed according to the same
pattern. Kleopatra herself may have added such a table as a useful appendix to which her
readers could turn. Nevertheless, since, in some cases, the text records the corresponding
standard value in the Roman currency system, valid for the 1st c. CE and afterward, the
extract may have been manipulated in the course of time, or an anonymous compiler may
have added the famous Egyptian Queen’s name to make his table on weights and measures
more authoritative.
Furthermore, according to Arabic tradition, Kleopatra is credited with both a late Greek
Dialogue between herself, as the mistress or as an important member of an Egyptian school
of alchemy, and some philosophers, on transformative dynamics in nature, and a book On
Poisons.
Ed.: MSR 1 (1864) 108–129, 233–236; J. Lindsay, The Origins of Alchemy in Greco-Roman Egypt (1970)
253 – 277; G. Marasco, “Cléopatre et les sciences de son temps,” in G. Argoud and J.-Y. Guillaumin,
edd., Sciences exactes et sciences appliquées à Alexandrie (1998) 39–53.
Mauro de Nardis
Kleophane ̄s (450 – 325 BCE)
P-G, H. P. 32 (19.324 K.), attributes the theory that males are gener-
ated by the right testicle, and females by the left, to “Kleophane ̄s,” citing A.
Presumably a scribal mistake for L, for whom the doctrine is attested: Aristotle,
GA 4.1 (765a25). (In the same paragraph, the text has “Hippo ̄nax” for H.)
(*)
PTK
Kleophantos (80 BCE – 80 CE)
Greek physician, identified (though not definitively) with a physician mentioned in a poison
case of 74 BCE (C Clu. 47). A, in G Antid. 2.1 (14.108–109 K.),
Kleopatra VII (inv. 1967.
152.567) © Courtesy of the
American Numismatic Society
KLEOPATRA OF ALEXANDRIA