Cleopatra′s Snake or Octavian′s? The Role of the Cobra in the triumph over the Egyptian Queen
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Lucyna Kostuch
Abstract
The snake′s familiar erotic connotation, consolidated in various interpretations, tends to limit consideration of the multifaceted capacity of this symbol as a carrier of specific content, which depending on the context, may be used in various meanings. Academic discussion on the symbolic meaning of the snake in Cleopatra′s act of suicide generally confines itself only to the Egyptian perspective or, more broadly, to that of the east (the uraeus, Isis, Bacchic elements), without considering the Roman space of military symbolism. The validity of reinterpreting the snake symbol in this specific situation is supported both by the fact that an image of Cleopatra with snake on display was carried in the triumphal procession, and by Octavian′s own association with it, which ascribes a military character to the reptile and provides reasons for the propaganda use of that symbol.
© by Akademie Verlag, Berlin, Germany
Articles in the same Issue
- Trasibulo y el fracaso de la reconstrucción imperial ateniense en la guerra de Corinto
- Verwehrte Ehre: Zur Wertigkeit des triumphus in monte Albano
- Politische Öffentlichkeit statt Mitbestimmung? Zur Bedeutung der contiones in der mittleren und späten römischen Republik
- Iscrizioni nord-umbre del bellum sociale nella Valle di Ospitale: prime indicazioni
- La guerra civil de las letras: religión, panfletarios y lucha política (49–44 a. C.)
- Cleopatra′s Snake or Octavian′s? The Role of the Cobra in the triumph over the Egyptian Queen
- Livio, Polión y la patavinitas. El relato historiográfico.
- The Significance of Roman Imperial Coin Types
- Zwischen Emotion und Normerfüllung – Verwandtschaftliche Beziehungen in den Schriften spätantiker gallischer Autoren
- Uso del passato nella declamazione 4 di Coricio di Gaza, „Milziade“ (XVII = decl. 4 F.-R.)
- Constantinus rerum novator: dal comitatus dioclezianeo ai palatini di Valentiniano I — Corrigendum (Klio 90/1, 2008)
- Besprechungen
- Literaturanzeigen; Liste der eingegangenen Literatur
Articles in the same Issue
- Trasibulo y el fracaso de la reconstrucción imperial ateniense en la guerra de Corinto
- Verwehrte Ehre: Zur Wertigkeit des triumphus in monte Albano
- Politische Öffentlichkeit statt Mitbestimmung? Zur Bedeutung der contiones in der mittleren und späten römischen Republik
- Iscrizioni nord-umbre del bellum sociale nella Valle di Ospitale: prime indicazioni
- La guerra civil de las letras: religión, panfletarios y lucha política (49–44 a. C.)
- Cleopatra′s Snake or Octavian′s? The Role of the Cobra in the triumph over the Egyptian Queen
- Livio, Polión y la patavinitas. El relato historiográfico.
- The Significance of Roman Imperial Coin Types
- Zwischen Emotion und Normerfüllung – Verwandtschaftliche Beziehungen in den Schriften spätantiker gallischer Autoren
- Uso del passato nella declamazione 4 di Coricio di Gaza, „Milziade“ (XVII = decl. 4 F.-R.)
- Constantinus rerum novator: dal comitatus dioclezianeo ai palatini di Valentiniano I — Corrigendum (Klio 90/1, 2008)
- Besprechungen
- Literaturanzeigen; Liste der eingegangenen Literatur
