lokiofasgard:

“gentle reminder that cleopatra’s beauty is rumored to have started wars in ancient history” — a post going around Tumblr

Actually Cleopatra was said to have not actually been that beautiful — men said that until she opened her mouth, she was simply average. What made her beautiful according to Plutarch was her personality and intelligence. Her sparkling wit, charming personality, talent with over half a dozen languages, and in-depth knowledge of almost everything was just so impressive that she often became beautiful in their eyes.

So while that post is nice in that it’s trying to say that women are becoming more beautiful and that if you lived in 30 B.C., you could have started wars, I like this version much better.

You may not be traditionally beautiful, but goddamn neither was Cleopatra and she seduced two of the most powerful men in the world.