“Cleopatra a Gipsy”: Performing the Nomadic Subject in Shakespeare’s Alexandria, Rome and London

Abstract

At the beginning of Antony and Cleopatra the Egyptian queen is referred to

as a ‘gypsy’. This term had different negative meanings in early modern

English, from nomad to Egyptian to whore. The epithet evokes, among

other things, the persecution of ‘Egyptians’, or gypsies, in Tudor and Stuart

England, as well as the anti-vagrancy legislation and literature. This paper

explores the ‘Egyptian’ qualities attributed to Cleopatra, especially her

supposed nomadism, both in Shakespeare’s tragedy and in cultural history.

Keywords: Cleopatra, Gypsies, Vagrancy laws, Nomadism, Cultural

history