Plutarch berichtet:
Many kings and great commanders made petition to Caesar for the
body of Antony, to give him his funeral rites; but he would not
take away his corpse from Cleopatra, by whose hands he was
buried with royal splendor and magnificence, it being granted to
her to employ what she pleased on his funeral. In this
extremity of grief and sorrow, and having inflamed and ulcerated
her breasts with beating them, she fell into a high fever, and
was very glad of the occasion, hoping, under this pretext, to
abstain from food, and so to die in quiet without interference.
She had her own physician, Olympus, to whom she told the truth,
and asked his advice and help to put an end to herself, as
Olympus himself has told us, in a narrative which he wrote of
these events. But Caesar, suspecting her purpose, took to
menacing language about her children, and excited her fears for
them, before which engines her purpose shook and gave way, so
that she suffered those about her to give her what meat or
medicine they pleased.
Some few days after, Caesar himself came to make her a visit and
comfort her. She lay then upon her pallet-bed in undress,
and, on his entering in, sprang up from off her bed, having
nothing on but the one garment next her body, and flung herself
at his feet, her hair and face looking wild and disfigured, her
voice quivering, and her eyes sunk in her head. The marks of
the blows she had given herself were visible about her bosom,
and altogether her whole person seemed no less afflicted than
her soul. But, for all this, her old charm, and the boldness of
her youthful beauty had not wholly left her, and, in spite of
her present condition, still sparkled from within, and let
itself appear in all the movements of her countenance. Caesar,
desiring her to repose herself, sat down by her; and, on this
opportunity, she said something to justify her actions,
attributing what she had done to the necessity she was under,
and to her fear of Antony; and when Caesar, on each point, made
his objections, and she found herself confuted, she broke off at
once into language of entreaty and deprecation, as if she
desired nothing more than to prolong her life. And at last,
having by her a list of her treasure, she gave it into his
hands; and when Seleucus, one of her stewards, who was by,
pointed out that various articles were omitted, and charged her
with secreting them, she flew up and caught him by the hair, and
struck him several blows on the face. Caesar smiling and
withholding her, "Is it not very hard, Caesar," said she, "when
you do me the honor to visit me in this condition I am in, that
I should be accused by one of my own servants of laying by some
women's toys, not meant to adorn, be sure, my unhappy self, but
that I might have some little present by me to make your Octavia
and your Livia, that by their intercession I might hope to find
you in some measure disposed to mercy?" Caesar was pleased to
hear her talk thus, being now assured that she was desirous to
live. And, therefore, letting her know that the things she had
laid by she might dispose of as she pleased, and his usage of
her should be honorable above her expectation, he went away,
well satisfied that he had overreached her, but, in fact, was
himself deceived.
There was a young man of distinction among Caesar's companions,
named Cornelius Dolabella. He was not without a certain
tenderness for Cleopatra, and sent her word privately, as she
had besought him to do, that Caesar was about to return through
Syria, and that she and her children were to be sent on within
three days. When she understood this, she made her request to
Caesar that he would be pleased to permit her to make oblations
to the departed Antony; which being granted, she ordered herself
to be carried to the place where he was buried, and there,
accompanied by her women, she embraced his tomb with tears in
her eyes, and spoke in this manner: "O, dearest Antony," said
she, "it is not long since that with these hands I buried you;
then they were free, now I am a captive, and pay these last
duties to you with a guard upon me, for fear that my just griefs
and sorrows should impair my servile body, and make it less fit
to appear in their triumph over you. No further offerings or
libations expect from me; these are the last honors that
Cleopatra can pay your memory, for she is to be hurried away far
from you. Nothing could part us whilst we lived, but death
seems to threaten to divide us. You, a Roman born, have found a
grave in Egypt; I, an Egyptian, am to seek that favor, and none
but that, in your country. But if the gods below, with whom
you now are, either can or will do anything (since those above
have betrayed us), suffer not your living wife to be abandoned;
let me not be led in triumph to your shame, but hide me and bury
me here with you, since, amongst all my bitter misfortunes,
nothing has afflicted me like this brief time that I have lived
away from you."
Having made these lamentations, crowning the tomb with garlands
and kissing it, she gave orders to prepare her a bath, and,
coming out of the bath, she lay down and made a sumptuous meal.
And a country fellow brought her a little basket, which the
guards intercepting and asking what it was, the fellow put the
leaves which lay uppermost aside, and showed them it was full of
figs; and on their admiring the largeness and beauty of the
figs, he laughed, and invited them to take some, which they
refused, and, suspecting nothing, bade him carry them in. After
her repast, Cleopatra sent to Caesar a letter which she had
written and sealed; and, putting everybody out of the monument
but her two women, she shut the doors. Caesar, opening her
letter, and finding pathetic prayers and entreaties that she
might be buried in the same tomb with Antony, soon guessed what
was doing. At first he was going himself in all haste, but,
changing his mind, he sent others to see. The thing had been
quickly done. The messengers came at full speed, and found the
guards apprehensive of nothing; but on opening the doors, they
saw her stone-dead, lying upon a bed of gold, set out in all her
royal ornaments. Iras, one of her women, lay dying at her feet,
and Charmion, just ready to fall, scarce able to hold up her
head, was adjusting her mistress's diadem. And when one that
came in said angrily, "Was this well done of your lady,
Charmion?" "Extremely well," she answered, "and as became the
descendant of so many kings"; and as she said this, she fell
down dead by the bedside.
Some relate that an asp was brought in amongst those figs and
covered with the leaves, and that Cleopatra had arranged that it
might settle on her before she knew, but, when she took away
some of the figs and saw it, she said, "So here it is," and held
out her bare arm to be bitten. Others say that it was kept in a
vase, and that she vexed and pricked it with a golden spindle
till it seized her arm. But what really took place is known to
no one. Since it was also said that she carried poison in a
hollow bodkin, about which she wound her hair; yet there was not
so much as a spot found, or any symptom of poison upon her body,
nor was the asp seen within the monument; only something like
the trail of it was said to have been noticed on the sand by the
sea, on the part towards which the building faced and where the
windows were. Some relate that two faint puncture-marks were
found on Cleopatra's arm, and to this account Caesar seems to
have given credit; for in his triumph there was carried a figure
of Cleopatra, with an asp clinging to her. Such are the various
accounts. But Caesar, though much disappointed by her death,
yet could not but admire the greatness of her spirit, and gave
order that her body should he buried by Antony with royal
splendor and magnificence. Her women, also, received honorable
burial by his directions. Cleopatra had lived nine and thirty
years, during twenty-two of which she had reigned as queen, and
for fourteen had been Antony's partner in his empire. Antony,
according to some authorities, was fifty-three, according to
others, fifty-six years old. His statues were all thrown down,
but those of Cleopatra were left untouched; for Archibius, one
of her friends, gave Caesar two thousand talents to save them
from the fate of Antony's.
Auch sehr schön ausgeprägt auf diesem Stück. 