Tarsus

“The barge she sat in, like a burnish’d throne, / Burn’d on the water…” writes Shakespeare in ‘Antony and Cleopatra’. But which water was that barge on? In 41 BC, Cleopatra glided up the Kydnos, today’s Berdan River, toward Tarsus to meet Mark Antony. According to Plutarch, the barge had a gilded stern, purple sails and silver oars, and was rowed to the music of flutes… Does anyone go to a meeting so well prepared? For Cleopatra, without a doubt.