In his Life of Antony, Plutarch remarks that " judging by the proofs which she had had before this of the effect of her beauty upon Caius Caesar and Gnaeus the son of Pompey, she had hopes that she would more easily bring Antony to her feet.

Thereafter, Octavian started a propaganda war, denouncing Antony as an enemy of Rome, asserting that he was seeking to establish a personal monarchy over the entire Roman Empire on the behalf of Caesarion, completely circumventing the Roman Senate.

As the Second Triumvirate formally expired on the last day of 33 BC, Antony wrote to the Senate that he did not wish to be reappointed.

Gnaeus Ahenobarbus seems to have wished to keep quiet ; but Gaius Sosius on 1 January made an elaborate speech in favor of Antony, and would have proposed the confirmation of his act had it not been vetoed by a tribune.

But, by the publication of Antony's will, which had been put into his hands by the traitor Plancus, and by carefully letting it be known at Rome what preparations were going on at Samos, and how entirely Antony was acting as the agent of Cleopatra, Octavian produced such a violent outburst of feeling that he easily obtained Antony's deposition from the consulship of 31, for which he had been designated, and a vote for a proclamation of war against Cleopatra, well understood to mean against Antony, though he was not named.

Antony had hoped to use his biggest ships to drive back Agrippa's wing on the north end of his line, but Octavian's entire fleet, aware of this strategy, stayed out of range.

Eventually, Antony sent the ships on the northern part of the formation to attack.

Antony seized the opportunity and with Cleopatra on her ship and him on a different ship, sped through the gap and escaped, abandoning his entire force.

Antony, who had found himself generally deserted, after vainly attempting to secure the army stationed near Paraetonium under Pinarius, and sending his eldest son Antyllus with money to Octavian and an offer to live at Athens as a private citizen, found himself in the spring attacked on two sides.

Antony was defeated by Gallus, and returning to Egypt, advanced on Pelusium.

Faustus Cornelius Sulla Felix, married to his daughter Claudia Antonia, was only descended from Octavia and Antony on one side — not close enough to the Imperial family to prevent doubts ( that did not stop others from making him the object of a coup attempt against Nero a few years later ).

A member of the Antonia clan ( gens ), Antony was born on January 14, 83 BC.

In 46 BC he seems to have taken offense because Caesar insisted on payment for the property of Pompey which Antony professedly had purchased, but had in fact simply appropriated.

Conflict soon arose, and, as on other occasions, Antony resorted to violence.

When they knew that Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius were assembling an army in order to march on Rome, Antony, Octavian and Lepidus allied in November 43 BC, forming the Second Triumvirate to stop Caesar's assassins.

After the battle, a new arrangement was made between the members of the Second Triumvirate: while Octavian returned to Rome, Antony went on to govern the east.

With this military purpose on his mind, Antony sailed to Greece with Octavia, where he behaved in a most extravagant manner, assuming the attributes of the Greek god Dionysus in 39 BC.

Gnaeus was thus the grandson of Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus ( consul 32 BC ) and probably Aemilia Lepida on his father's side, and the grandson of Mark Antony and Octavia Minor on his mother's side.

Agrippina's father, Germanicus, was a grandson of Augustus's wife, Livia, on one side and to Mark Antony and Octavia on the other.

The younger man is Mark Antony being lured by the wiles of the reclining woman ( who is Cleopatra, with the snake being an asp ) into losing his manly romanitas and becoming decadent, with the bearded elder male figure being his mythical ancestor Anton looking on.

The woman languishing is Octavia Minor, abandoned by Mark Antony, between her brother Augustus ( left, as a god, as on the contemporary Sword of Tiberius ) and Venus Genetrix, the ancestor of Augustus and Octavia's Julian gens.

* 44 BC – Cicero launches the first of his Philippics ( oratorical attacks ) on Mark Antony.

* In 27 BC, following his defeat of Mark Antony and Cleopatra, the Roman Senate voted him new titles, officially becoming Imperator Caesar Divi Filius Augustus.

A fictionalized version of this Ahenobarbus appears in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra under the name of " Enobarbus "

The final conflict was provoked by Antony, who is said to have been persuaded by his lover, the queen Cleopatra of Egypt, to retire to her land and give battle to mask his retreat ; but lack of provisions and the growing demoralization of his army would eventually account for this decision.

It was a naval engagement fought between the forces of Octavian and the combined forces of Mark Antony and Cleopatra VII.

That occurred when Mark Antony, the other most influential member of the Triumvirate, abandoned his wife, Octavian's sister Octavia Minor, and moved to Egypt to start a long-term romance with Cleopatra, thus becoming de facto stepfather to Caesarion.

In fact, Antony and Cleopatra formally elevated to power Caesarion, then thirteen years of age, in 34 BC, giving him the vague but alarming title of " King of the Kings " ( Donations of Alexandria ).

Octavian complained that Antony had no authority for being in Egypt ; that his execution of Sextus Pompeius was illegal ; that his treachery to the king of Armenia disgraced the Roman name ; that he had not sent half the proceeds of the spoils to Rome according to his agreement ; that his connection with Cleopatra and the acknowledgment of Caesarion as a legitimate son of Julius Caesar were a degradation of his office and a menace to himself.

Octavian was not present, but at the next meeting made a reply of such a nature that the consuls both left Rome to join Antony ; and Antony, when he heard of it, after publicly divorcing Octavia, came at once to Ephesus with Cleopatra, where a vast fleet was gathered from all parts of the East, of which Cleopatra furnished a large proportion.

Antony foresaw that he would not be able to defeat Octavian's forces, so he and Cleopatra stayed in the rear of the formation.

Mark Antony then tried to flee from the battle, and as a result of a communication breakdown, came to believe that Cleopatra had been captured, and hence committed suicide.

Cleopatra VII ( 69 – 30 BC ) was the last pharaoh of Egypt, famed lover of Mark Antony and Julius Caesar.

* Cleopatra Selene II ( 40 – 5 BC ), daughter of Cleopatra VII and Mark Antony

He also played a role in a tour of Antony and Cleopatra, produced by the actress Katharine Cornell in 1946.

The phrase " gaudy night " is taken from Shakespeare's Antony & Cleopatra:

Herod originally leased Jericho from Cleopatra, after Mark Antony gave it to her as a gift.

Mark Antony supposedly gave Cleopatra over 200, 000 scrolls ( taken from the great Library of Pergamum ) for the library as a wedding gift, but this is regarded by some historians as a propagandist claim meant to show Antony's allegiance to Egypt rather than Rome.

Antonia Minor was the second daughter born to Octavia Minor and triumvir Mark Antony, hence Antonia ’ s maternal uncle was Augustus.

Cicero is the only Roman source that mentions Antony ’ s first wife.

Drusilla ’ s paternal grandmother, the Queen of Mauretania Cleopatra Selene II, was a daughter of the Ptolemaic Greek Queen Cleopatra VII of Egypt and Roman triumvir Mark Antony.

It seems that in reality Antony wanted Cleopatra ’ s promise to support his intended war against the Parthians.

Many critics have noted the strong influence of Virgil ’ s first century Roman epic poem, the Aeneid, on Shakespeare ’ s Antony and Cleopatra.

Moreover, as is well-known, the historical Antony and Cleopatra were the prototypes and antitypes for Virgil ’ s Dido and Aeneas: Dido, ruler of the north African city of Carthage, tempts Aeneas, the legendary exemplar of Roman pietas, to forego his task of founding Rome after the fall of Troy.

The fictional Aeneas dutifully resists Dido ’ s temptation and abandons her to forge on to Italy, placing political destiny before romantic love, in stark contrast to his historical counterpart Antony, who puts passionate love of his own African queen, Cleopatra, before duty to Rome.

Given the well-established traditional connections between the fictional Dido and Aeneas and the historical Antony and Cleopatra, it is no surprise that Shakespeare includes numerous allusions to Virgil ’ s epic in his historical tragedy.

As Janet Adelman observes, “ almost all the central elements in Antony and Cleopatra are to be found in the Aeneid: the opposing values of Rome and a foreign passion ; the political necessity of a passionless Roman marriage ; the concept of an afterlife in which the passionate lovers meet .” However, as Heather James argues, Shakespeare ’ s allusions to Virgil ’ s Dido and Aeneas are far from slavish imitations.

James emphasizes the various ways in which Shakespeare ’ s play subverts the ideology of the Virgilian tradition ; one such instance of this subversion is Cleopatra ’ s dream of Antony in Act 5 (“ I dreamt there was an Emperor Antony ” ).

James argues that in her extended description of this dream, Cleopatra “ reconstructs the heroic masculinity of an Antony whose identity has been fragmented and scattered by Roman opinion .” This politically charged dream vision is just one example of the way that Shakespeare ’ s version of the historical tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra destabilizes and potentially critiques the imperialist Roman ideology inherited from Virgil ’ s epic and embodied in the mythic Roman ancestor Aeneas.

He states specifically, " Almost all critical approaches to this play have been coloured by the sexist assumptions the critics have brought with them to their reading .” One seemingly anti-sexist viewpoint comes from Donald C. Freeman ’ s articulations of the meaning and significance of the deaths of both Antony and Cleopatra at the end of the play.

These constant shifts in the perception of Cleopatra are well represented in a review of Estelle Parsons ’ adaptation of Shakespeare ’ s Antony and Cleopatra at the Interart Theatre in New York City.

Arthur Holmberg surmises, “ What had at first seemed like a desperate attempt to be chic in a trendy New York manner was, in fact, an ingenious way to characterize the differences between Antony ’ s Rome and Cleopatra ’ s Egypt.

The lack of tolerance exerted by the hard-edged Roman military code allots to a general ’ s dalliance is metaphorized as a container, a measuring cup that cannot hold the liquid of Antony ’ s grand passion.