Cleopatra lived closer in time to the Moon landing than to the building of the Great Pyramid of Giza.

The Great Pyramid of Giza was completed around 2560 BCE. Cleopatra VII, the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt, was born in 69 BCE — roughly 2,500 years after the pyramid was built. The Apollo 11 Moon landing happened in 1969 CE, about 2,000 years after Cleopatra’s death in 30 BCE.

That means fewer years separate Cleopatra from astronauts walking on the Moon than separate her from the pharaohs who built the monument she would have recognized as already ancient. It’s a useful reminder of just how much history compresses the more distant it gets — “ancient Egypt” spans a longer stretch of time than the entire span from Cleopatra to today.