October 48 – March 47 BC · Alexandria, Egypt Theater
October 48 – March 47 BC
Caesar followed Pompey to Egypt and arrived to find him already murdered. He installed himself in the royal palace at Alexandria with only 3,200 men — far too few to safely occupy a hostile city of a million people. The Egyptian court, ruled effectively by the eunuch Pothinus and the general Achillas, had murdered Pompey to please Rome but resented Caesar's occupation and his support for the exiled queen Cleopatra. She famously had herself smuggled into the palace in a rolled carpet — or a linen sack according to some sources — to present herself to Caesar personally, beginning a political and romantic alliance that would last until Caesar's death. When Achillas's army of 20,000 surrounded the palace quarter, Caesar was trapped for months. He burned Ptolemy's fleet in the harbor — the fire spreading to some buildings on the shore, though not, as later legend claimed, to the famous Library. Reinforcements finally arrived; Ptolemy XIII drowned in the Nile trying to escape. Caesar spent two more months in Egypt before departing, leaving Cleopatra pregnant with a son, Caesarion.
Commanders