Octavian's Campsite Memorial in Nikopolis

On September 2nd in 31 B.C.E., the forces of Octavian defeated the forces of Mark Antony in a battle on Cape of Actium, a battle much dramatised in Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra and movies such as Cleopatra. Despite this modern day preoccupation with Cleopatra, the Battle of Actium was the crucial event in Octavian’s final rise to power, not Cleopatra’s. (Actually, Cleopatra fled from the site of the battle.) And while might be debate about the precise nature of the battle, there is no doubt that this battle was a major turning point in the course of Western history. from http://janusquirinus.org/

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Note:

This paper was written in 1995 before I knew of the book “Actium and Augustus” by Robert Alan Gurval published in the same year, and therefore, did not reference it.

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Updated on 7th August 2004.

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