Yasmine Zahran first encountered Zenobia, the third-century Arab Syrian Palyrene queen who led the revolt against the Romans, in 1973 when she was working as a young archaeologist in the Levant. So began a lifetime's preoccupation with the woman who ruled over the Egypt she conquered and quashed all Roman rule in her wake. Although she was eventually defeated by the Emperor Aurelian in AD 274, Zenobia's life is a story of remarkable drama...