Two complete, independent versions of this play exist. Sri Aurobindo wrote the first one in Baroda between 31 January and 14 February 1906, on the eve of his departure from the state to join the national movement. In May 1908 the notebooks containing his fair copy of Rodogune, like the notebook containing The Viziers of Bassora, were seized by the police when Sri Aurobindo was arrested. Fortunately, other notebooks remaining in his possession contained much of the penultimate draft of the 1906 version. Basing himself on these passages, he was able to reconstruct the play in Pondicherry around 1912. This version was published in the Sri Aurobindo Mandir Annual and separately in 1958. It supersedes the Baroda version, which was recovered in 1952.
The plot of Rodogune derives ultimately from the history of Cleopatra, Queen of Syria, as recounted by such classical historians as Appian, Justin and Josephus. The immediate source probably was Rodogune (1645), by the French dramatist Pierre Corneille.