According to an item at The Writer’s Almanac last year:
It was on this day in 30 BC that Queen Cleopatra of Egypt killed herself with a snake she had smuggled into her chamber where she was held captive by Octavian, formerly the political rival of her lover Mark Antony. Octavian had defeated Cleopatra and Antony at the Battle of Actium and had taken Cleopatra prisoner. When Cleopatra learned that Octavian planned to parade her as part of his triumphant return to Rome, she planned her own suicide. For centuries, it was assumed that the snake she used was an asp, but it is now thought that the snake was an Egyptian cobra.
Other sources say it was August 12, not August 30, so I guess those Writer’s Almanac folks got 30 BC and August 30 mixed up. Whatever.
Cleopatra was Greek, the last queen of Ptolemaic Egypt. When she was 17-18, Cleopatra and her 12-year-old brother/husband inherited the throne from their father. They fought over who was really the ruler, with Ptolemy XIII emerging as victor until Julius Caesar showed up. And the rest, as they say, was history.
Cleo was the mother of four children, one with Julius Gaius Caesar (31 years her senior) and three with Mark Antony (14 years her senior). Cleopatra was 39 when she died.