Museo Pio-Clementino in the context of "Caduceus"

The reign of Cleopatra VII of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt began with the death of her father, Ptolemy XII Auletes, by March 51 BC. It ended with her suicide in August 30 BC, which also marked the conclusion of the Hellenistic period and the annexation of Egypt into a Roman province. In the style of her Greek predecessors, Cleopatra reigned over Egypt and other territories as an absolute monarch, although the Roman Republic frequently interfered in its internal affairs. Her personal rule of Egypt was characterized by a continued reliance on agriculture, extensive trade and conflict with other states, the tackling of corruption, strategic management of the bureaucracy, and ambitious building projects.

Cleopatra initially acceded to the throne alongside her younger brother Ptolemy XIII, but a fallout between them led to open civil war. Further chaos ensued when the Roman consul Julius Caesar pursued his rival Pompey into Ptolemaic Egypt, a Roman client state. Upon arrival, Caesar discovered that Pompey had been assassinated on the orders of Ptolemy XIII. Caesar attempted to reconcile the siblings, but a discontent Ptolemy XIII and his adviser Potheinos raised forces against Caesar and Cleopatra. Reinforcements lifted the siege in early 47 BC, and Ptolemy XIII died shortly afterwards in the Battle of the Nile. Arsinoe IV (Cleopatra's younger sister and a rival claimant to the throne) was exiled, and Caesar, now dictator, declared Cleopatra and her younger brother Ptolemy XIV co-rulers of Egypt. However, Caesar maintained a private affair with Cleopatra that produced a son, Caesarion, before he departed Alexandria for Rome.

In Ancient Greece a thyrsus (/ˈθɜːrsəs/) or thyrsos (/ˈθɜːrsɒs/; Ancient Greek: θύρσος) was a wand or staff of giant fennel (Ferula communis) covered with ivy vines and leaves, sometimes wound with taeniae and topped with a pine cone, artichoke, fennel, or by a bunch of vine-leaves and grapes or ivy-leaves and berries, carried during Hellenic festivals and religious ceremonies. The thyrsus is typically associated with the Greek god Dionysus (and his subsequent Roman equivalent Bacchus) as a symbol of prosperity, fertility, and hedonism.

The gens Julia was one of the most prominent patrician families of ancient Rome. From the early decades of the Republic, members of this gens served in the highest offices of the Roman state, beginning with Gaius Julius Iulus, consul in 489 BC. However, the Julii are perhaps best known for Gaius Julius Caesar, the dictator and adoptive father of the emperor Augustus, through whom the name was passed to the Julio-Claudian dynasty of the first century AD. The nomen Julius became very common in imperial times, as the descendants of persons enrolled as citizens under the early emperors began to make their mark in history.

Neoclassical Hellenism is a term introduced primarily during the European Romantic era by Johann Joachim Winckelmann.

The Sarcophagi of Helena and Constantina are two fourth century porphyry sarcophagi located in the Pio-Clementine Vatican Museum in Rome.