[5][6][7] After Antony and Cleopatra's defeat at Actium and their suicides in Egypt in 30 BC, Selene and her brothers were brought to Rome and placed in the household of Octavian's sister, Octavia the Younger, a former wife of her father.

The twins were formally acknowledged by their father, Triumvir Mark Antony, during a political meeting with their mother in 37 BC.

Their mother most likely planned for Selene to marry her older half-brother Caesarion, son of Cleopatra by Julius Caesar, after whom he was named.

Cleopatra Selene, Alexander Helios, and Ptolemy Philadelphos were sent south to Thebes, but were apprehended by Roman soldiers en route and brought back to Alexandria.

During his triumph celebrating his conquest of Egypt, he paraded the twins dressed as the moon and the sun in heavy golden chains, behind an effigy of their mother clutching an asp to her arm.

In the absence of any surviving relative, responsibility for the children passed to Augustus, who in turn gave the siblings to Octavia to be raised in her household on the Palatine Hill.

[9] They were members of an extended family that included their half-brother Iullus Antonius (their father's son with his late wife Fulvia), their half-sisters, both called Antonia (daughters of their father with Octavia), and Octavia's older children from a previous marriage, Marcus Claudius Marcellus and his two sisters Claudia Marcella Major and Claudia Marcella Minor.

[note 1] Octavia arranged for Cleopatra Selene to marry the intellectual King Juba II of Numidia, whose father had committed suicide in 46 BC.

Their products included fish, grapes, pearls, figs, grain, wooden furniture and purple dye harvested from shellfish.

The construction and sculptural projects at Caesarea and Volubilis display a mixture of Ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman architectural styles.

[16] These buildings included a lighthouse in the style of Pharos of Alexandria in the harbour, a royal palace situated in the seafront, and numerous temples dedicated to Roman and Egyptian deities.

Her vigorous promotion of her mother's legacy stood in sharp contrast to the negative image being disseminated in contemporary Augustan poetry.

The following epigram by Greek epigrammatist Crinagoras of Mytilene is considered to be her eulogy:[13] The moon herself grew dark, rising at sunset, Covering her suffering in the night, Because she saw her beautiful namesake, Selene, Breathless, descending to Hades, With her she had had the beauty of her light in common, And mingled her own darkness with her death.

[19] Selene was placed in the Royal Mausoleum of Mauretania in modern Algeria, built by her and Juba east of Caesarea and still visible.

Their remains have not been found at the site, perhaps due to tomb raids, possibly shortly after the mausoleum's construction; or because the structure was meant to serve as a memorial and not as a place of burial.