Duane W. Roller

Homeric scholar Aristarchos of Samothrake held the same position for
Ptolemy VIII, and probably his siblings.
Cleopatra VII’s fi rst child was born three and a half years into her
reign; at its end her four children ranged in age from 7 to 17. Royal tutors
would be a necessity, especially during the last decade of her rule. It is
perhaps indicative of the era than three of the four known tutors have
no apparent scholarly profi le. Euphronios evidently had some diplomatic
skills, because he was one of the negotiators with Octavian aft er Actium.
Rhodon is remembered only for his involvement in the death of his pupil,
Caesarion. Th ere was also Th eodoros, tutor of Antonius’s son Antyllus,
who betrayed his pupil. 26 Th eir total obscurity and quickness to join
Octavian even if fatal to their charges indicates that they probably had
little if any scholarly distinction, and it is unlikely that any of these tutors
held the post of Librarian. But Cleopatra was fortunate to have at her
court someone who would become one of the most signifi cant scholars of
the following era, Nikolaos of Damascus. He was probably near the beginning
of his career, a student of the historian Timagenes of Alexandria,
who had gone to Rome with Gabinius in 55 b.c. and became associated
with Antonius. Nikolaos may have come to the court through Timagenes’
recommendation. In later years, when service to Cleopatra and Antonius
was not something that he would want on his résumé, he attempted to
suppress this youthful indiscretion and almost succeeded. 27 Aft er the
collapse of Cleopatra’s court, Nikolaos ended up at Herod’s, serving as his
ambassador to Rome and court chronicler. He also became an intimate of
Augustus and shuttled back and forth between Judaea and Rome for more
than a quarter of a century. He was involved in the succession struggles
aft er Herod’s death in 4 b.c. but then retired from politics. During his
career he wrote an autobiography, an extant biography of Augustus, and
a lengthy universal history, which survives in many fragments and was
the primary source that Josephus used for the reign of Herod. Without
Nikolaos, little would be known about that turbulent environment or
about Cleopatra’s involvement in it. Moreover, he almost certainly infl uenced
his pupil Cleopatra Selene in her creation of a Ptolemaic government
in exile at Mauretanian Caesarea: one would expect that the two
continued in contact in Rome aft er 30 b.c. Although Nikolaos’s interests
were narrowly focused, and he came to be an apologist for Herod, he is
the most extensive contemporary literary source for Cleopatra VII and
the most probable candidate to have been her Librarian.
128 Cleopatra