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Cleopatra VII (69—30 BCE) was the last pharaoh of ancient Egypt and last of the Ptolemaic dynasty.<br/><br/> Famed historically as a classic femme fatale, Cleopatra seduced Roman emperor Julius Caesar in order to secure her place on the Egyptian throne. After Caesar’s assassination in 44 BCE, Rome became divided between his heir, Gaius Octavian (later known as Augustus), and his military commander Mark Anthony. Cleopatra aligned herself with Mark Anthony and used her powers of seduction upon him. He fell in love with her and stayed with her at the Egyptian court in Alexandria. The couple had two children. But after losing the Battle of Actium, both Mark Anthony and Cleopatra committed suicide rather than be taken to Rome as prisoners. Cleopatra famously killed herself on 12th August, 30 BCE, by the bite of an asp.<br/><br/> In this scene from her court in Alexandria, Cleopatra has bet her lover Mark Anthony that she could there and then host a banquet for the princely sum of 10 million sestertia. After Mark Anthony accepted the wager, Cleopatra removed one of her pearl earrings, dissolved it in vinegar, then drank it. She is in the process of removing her second earring to do likewise, but is stopped by the disapproving former Roman senator Lucius Plancus.
This scene is taken from the Book of Samuel in the Hebrew Bible, or the Christian Old Testament.<br/><br/> King David of Israel looked out of his palace one evening and saw Bathsheba bathing, assisted by her two servants. He immediately fell in love with her. Although she was married—the wife of Uriah the Hittite—King David was smitten by her beauty and seduced her, making her pregnant. He took her to be his wife and she gave birth to Solomon.
Jin Ping Mei or The Plum in the Golden Vase (also The Golden Lotus) is a Chinese novel composed in the vernacular (baihua) during the late Ming Dynasty. The author was Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng. Jin Ping Mei is sometimes considered to be the fifth classical novel after the Four Great Classical Novels. It is the first full-length Chinese fictional work to depict sexuality in a graphically explicit manner, and as such has a notoriety in China akin to Fanny Hill or Lady Chatterley's Lover in English. Jin Ping Mei takes its name from the three central female characters — Pan Jinlian, whose name means "Golden Lotus"); Li Ping'er (literally, "Little Vase"), a concubine of Ximen Qing; and Pang Chunmei ("Spring plum blossoms"), a young maid who rose to power within the family. Within more conservative Chinese societies, Jin Ping Mei is considered to be pornographic material, due to its contents.