By the time Cleopatra was born, the Great Pyramid was already more than two thousand years old — older to her than she is to us, which means she stood closer in time to the moon landing than to the monument she grew up beside

Khufu, the pharaoh who ordered the Great Pyramid built, reigned from about 2589 to 2566 BC and completed the monument around 2560 BC, as the World History Encyclopedia sets out. Khufu’s monument was also the tallest thing anyone on Earth had managed to build, a record it held for close to four thousand years. Measured in years alone, she was born nearer to the lunar module than to the pyramid she grew up next to. Mammoths outlasted the buildersWoolly mammoths were still walking around when the Great Pyramid was topped out. Why she reads as older than she isFile Cleopatra under ancient Egypt, and the label quietly misleads you.