Discussion: The Greatest Diadochi Kingdom

[RedFox]

Did I trigger a flame-war?

*cackles* Success!

Religion is just a means of controlling people. It always has and it always will be. The most awful example are the Muslim extremists who think they are doing it all for 'the holy cause', but they're really not following the ideals of Muslim beliefs at all with that.

I much rather prefer spiritual people, rather than religious people that belong to certain 'factions'. Being a subject for Christian brainwash many a time, I am really not optimistic about this whole religion thing.
For each one his own. The protestant church of course allows everyone to have a 'personal' relationship with god (spiritual belief) and not be that much tied down to ideals of the specific religion.

Sometimes, people just need something to believe in.

[Cal20]

Did I trigger a flame-war?

*cackles* Success!

Religion is just a means of controlling people. It always has and it always will be. The most awful example are the Muslim extremists who think they are doing it all for 'the holy cause', but they're really not following the ideals of Muslim beliefs at all with that..

Successful flame is successful!

and Spartan: "ok, let's stop this religion war.." funny you say that since religion seems to be the cause of or factor into most bloody wars .

But yeah I quite like Eumenes of Cardia, he may not be seen as holding much in the way of a Diadochi kingdom but was still an important player. He seemed to stay loyal to Alexander after his death, fighting for Alexander's son and attempting to keep Alexander's empire as unified as possible, although that was near on impossible with all the others vying for power. He seemed to be quite a good general, winning several battles. From what i've read as well he seemed pretty unfortunate, trying his best but being betrayed by his own officers.

[Prince of Epirus]

for me the Ptolemies are the best diadochi Kingdom having a good combo of rich lands and powerful egyptogreek armies made them pretty powerfull ,

[HappyJBH]

Its really a shame so much history was los or distorted... The people who burned great libraries didn't give flying flip about history. Imagine if the great library of Alexandria survived, we would know so much more.

[Sardaukar One]

Antigonus Monophthalmus(One eyed) was in my opinion, easily the strongest of the Diadochi.
It took four of the dynasts to bring him down.
And he had far greater control over Asia Minor than Lysimachus or the Seleucids ever did.

Certainly he was defeated at Ipsus, but it was a battle where he could just as easily won had his son not had a George Bush like attack of imbecility. You should never, ever lose contact with your line. Demetrias did, and his father was defeated and killed.

Griffith estimated that the military establishment under Antigonus prior to Ipsus had to be around 110,000-120,000 men.
I think it could well have been more.
Antigonus had 80,000 plus men at Ipsus. He also sent a force to attack Babylon in the hopes of deflecting Seleucus from his goal of linking up with Lysimachus. Surely at least five or six thousand men here.
Cities such as Tyre and Sidon must surely have had garrisons of five or six thousand men each. Both were able to resist Ptolemy. Plus there would have been numerous garrisons elsewhere such as Cyprus.
And this doesn't even include his fleets with which Demetrius was able to remain a player after Ipsus due to having the most powerful fleet and great bases in Cyprus, Tyre and Sidon. Control of the sea was clearly another reason Ptolemy was unable to take the aforementioned territories.

Lets compare these numbers with the monumental battle of Raphia or Panion, where the armies combined were 120,000 and 100,000 respectively. And the Seleucids and Ptolemies busted a gut to put such numbers into the field.

Antigonus clearly got the most financially out of his territories. Otherwise I don't know how else he could field such large armies.
He was eighty years old during Ipsus. A younger Antigonus wipes the floor with Lysimachus et al.

His biggest failures were his reliance and trust upon his family members.
Two nephews, Polemaios and Telesphoros both rebelled after being given positions of power. Polemaios really stuck it to Antigonus though. Between 312-310 BC, Polemaios booted Kassander out of most of Greece south of Thessaly, then rebelled against Antigonus for being insufficiently honored. He didn't like the fact that Demetrius was taking a more and more advanced postion in the Antigonid hierarchy. And what would happen to him when Philippos, the younger son of Antigonus took a more prominent role?
The shame of it was that Polemaios was very close to the same position Demetrius had Kassander in in 302 BC.
On the ropes and reeling!
Had the Antigonids knocked out Kassander in 310 or 309 BC, then it surely would have been curtains for the other dynasts.

Demetrius could be brilliant, as at Salamis in 306 BC and in Greece in 303 BC.
But then he could be a total imbecile such as at Gaza in 313 BC, Rhodes 305 BC and he let Kassander off the hook a bit in 302 BC. And the coup de grace being his sudden attack of retardation at Ipsus.

Antigonus reminds me a bit of Shibata Katsuie. Shibata lost the war despite not actually having lost a battle himself.
His subordinates failed him.
Such is life!

[Silver Legionary]

It took four of the dynasts to bring him down.

That's incredible.

I knew the other Diadochi(Seleukos, Ptolemaios, don't know the other two,
who were they? Pergamum, perhaps?) allied against him, but that in and of itself is mind-boggling.
C'mon, 4 nations had to unite to defeat one? Considering how powerful they were on their own,
it's a bit frightening how much power he must have had. lol.

The armies he used weren't levied peasants either, right? I bet they were professional forces.
Did the same go for his opponents?

I don't know much about this period, so this was really interesting to me.

[Sardaukar One]

@ Silver Legionary

There were four diadoch wars after Alexander died. Diadochi means successor.
And these wars are also known as the Successor wars.
The fourth diadoch war was concluded with the battle of Ipsus.
Many historians consider this to be the battle that finally decided that no one individual would rule Alexander's empire.
This of course did not stop the fighting between the Successor's. There was the war against Demetrius, when the remaining Diadochi combined to fight Antigonus' son in Macedon.
The war between Lysimachus and Seleucus.
And the Syrian wars fought between the Seleucids and Ptolemies over Coele-Syria(southern Syria), Phoenicia and Palestine.

The number of dynasts and the territories they ruled changed over the course of these wars as some came out of relative obscurity, such as Seleucus, and some were of course killed after starting out at the top, such as Perdiccas and Craterus.

After the third diadoch war, there was a much clearer picture of the dynasts and their territories.

1) Antigonus - At the beginning of the third diadoch war, he ruled all of Asia Minor, northern Syria and all the east to India. Certainly, his command of some of these satrapies was nominal at best, especially in the far east, but it was still an enourmous territory he commanded.
By Ipsus, Antigonus had lost all the east to Seleucus. In turn, he had taken the whole of the Levant down to Gaza from Ptolemy. And he also added Cyprus to his holdings in 306 BC as well as cementing his hold over Asia Minor.
Antigonid forces also had sway over much of mainland Greece for much of the preceding ten years or so as his forces drove Kassander out of Greece a few times.
Most of the Aegean Islands were also under his control or allied to him.

2) Kassander - He was the son of Antipater, Alexander's regent of Macedon and Europe.
Kassander controlled Macedon and Thessaly. And by extension, Greece.
Kassander was the primary receipient of Antigonid aggression. From the years 313-301, Kassander was able to dodge the proverbial bullet a number of times.
By the Ipsus campaign, he had lost all his possessions in Greece and Thessaly was being invaded by Demetrius. Kassander offered peace to Antigonus, but this was rejected out of hand.
Kassander sent envoys to the other dynasts for help. Probably with the arguement that if he fell, they would never be able to beat Antigonus.

3) Ptolemy - He originally ruled Egypt. But as the Diadoch wars progressed, he was able to add Libya, Cyrpus and all of the levant upto and including southern Syria by the end of the second Diadoch war.
However, despite the success of the battle of Gaza, Antigonus started to chop him down as he first removed Ptolemy from the Levant, and then Cyprus in 306 BC.
By the Ipsus campaign, Ptolemy had Egypt and Libya only and had lost naval superiority to Antigonus due to his defeat in Cyprus.

4) Seleucus - Originally the satrap of Babylon. He readily joined Antigonus in the second diadoch war against Eumenes and served Antigonus very well. After Antigonus defeated Eumenes, capable and popular commanders such as Peithon and Peukestas were removed one way or another.
Seleucus chose to flee to Ptolemy rather than face probable death.
The victory at Gaza over Demetrius allowed Seleucus to return to Babylon with a thousand men supplied to him by Ptolemy. By force or persuasion, Seleucus was able to build his forces upto to about four thousand men.
He took Babylon and then had to face the attack of the Antigonid general for Media, Nicanor with 20,000 men. Seleucus seems to have lured Nicanor into thinking he was far away. Nicanor camped for the night and failed to take proper precautions. Seleucus attacked at night and captured most of the army without much of a fight. In one blow he had shattered Antigonid might in the east and quadrupled his forces.
He was able to take the important province of Media and endured at least two Antigonid attacks.
One by Demetrius and the other by Antigonus. Seleucus apparently defeated Antigonus, though it was far from being a serious defeat.
Antigonus and Seleucus seem to have made an agreement to leave each other alone. This allowed Seleucus to take the eastern Satrapies during the years 308-303 BC. He also invaded India, but was defeated by Chandragupta Maurya. The result of this was a treaty where Chandragupta gave Seleucus 500 elephants and Seleucus ceded all rights to the Indian provinces conquered by Alexander.
By the time of Ipsus, Seleucus had all of the east barring the former Indian satrapies.

5) Lysimachus - At Babylon after Alexander's death, he was given the task of completing the conquest of Thrace. As Thrace was in Europe, he was subordinate to Antipater. He did not have a large army, but it was apparently quite grizzled from fighting the Thracians in which he was not always victorius. The Getae resisted him quite successfully for instance. He was quite possibly the weakest of the four coalition members arraigned against Antigonus. But he seems to have been a very capable and competent commander. Antigonus was able to get the black sea greek cities to rebel and send a mainly mecenary force to try and help them. Also, he got a Thracian king to rebel. Lysimachus was able to win out against all this, but it cost a lot of men.
Other that this one attempt, Antigonus left Lysimachus alone. Not sure why really?
Lysimachus was the first to arrive in Asia minor, but had to wait for Seleucus to arrive via Armenia.
He caused a lot of chaos for Antigonus, but Antigonus showed up with his field army and the shoe was soon on the other foot. I can't help but think that a younger Antigonus would have finished Lysimachus off before Seleucus arrived, but still, Lysimachus did well to survive.
Lysimachus commanded the phalanx at Ipsus.
At the time of Ipsus, Lysimachus contolled central and southern Thrace(Hellespont) as well as the greek cities on the Black Sea.


Dynasts 2-5 allied to take on Antigonus.

Here is a wiki link that gives you a good general overview of this era as well as maps.
Saying that, wikipedia does have a few things wrong but it will give you a good idea of how things played out.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diadochi

These were not four nations that united against one. All of the players were Macedonians. They generally used the same kinds of troops and the same kinds of tactics. It was essentially civil war. Fighting over a fragemented empire.
Certainly as the years progressed, these factions did become more like nations.

Antigonus seemed to have with him a standing army of about 40,000 men with him wherever he was. Probably more as it was a superior army to that of Lysimachus and Prepelaos when they landed in Asia Minor.
If not superior numbers wise versus Lysimachus, his standing army was certainly far superior to that of Lysimachus in cavalry and elephants. Which may well have contributed to coalition strategy to avoid Antigonus as best they could and wait for Seleucus and his troops to arrive.
Craterus was defeated and killed against Eumenes mainly because he had little or no cavalry.
Eumenes was able to use his large cavalry force against Craterus to great effect.

His army probably was comprised of the bulk of the Macedonians still serving in the military within his realm, the companion cavalry, his agema(bodygaurd) and other crack units, such as the Hypaspists.
This army would have been augmented with mercenary and locally recruited units.
Median cavalry, Tarentine horse etc would have all served in his armies at one time or another.
Antigonus was apparently a big user of Asian troops trained in Macedonian fashion. But from what I can tell, much of his phalanx troops apart from the Macedonians were formed by Greeks and mercs.
Usually Greek mercs!
They formed mainly his phalanx troops and peltasts.
Still, this "central" army was probaly top notch across the board.
Plus the elephants would almost certainly have all been stationed with Antigonus.

The allied forces are a little harder to estimate.
At Ipsus they combined for something like 64,000 infantry and 14,000 cavalry. As to the compostion, heavy infantry vs light infantry, its harder to tell. Its known that Seleucus bought 20,000 infantry and 12,000 cavalry to Ipsus. To this can be added 400 elephants and 120 scythed chariots.
This means that Lysimachus and Prepelaos brought 44,000 men and 2000 cavalry.
There is no way Lsyimachus could have fieleded this many troops. Perhaps 25,000 men at the most.
The view that Kassander contributed little to the campaign has to be rejected out of hand.
He must have supplied at least 15,000 men under Prepelaos. And the bulk of them were probably phalangites. Kassander would have certainly provided the bulk of the Macedonian pikemen.
Lysimachus would have had few Macedonians or Greeks in his army. He also was probably the poorest of the dynasts. Meaning he might have had a hard time keeping large armies in the field.
When word of Seleucus' marching on Asia Minor reached Antigonus, he recalled Demetrius from Thessaly.
This allowed Kassander to send additional reinforcements of between 12,000 -15,000 men.
Unfortunately, only one third of them made it. They had to cross via the Black sea.
Demetrius cut off the Hellespont.
The first crossing arrived safely. The second was intercepted and the third was shipwrecked with 500 survivors only.

At Ipsus, despite having a superiority in cavalry, Antigonus had a sufficiently larger amount of heavy cavalry. The east provided Seleucus with good light cavalry, horse archers etc. But apart from perhaps Media, the east lacked good recruiting grounds for heavy cavalry.
Its also probable that Seleucus probably didn't bring that many phalangites. He simply didn't have access to many Macedonians or Greeks. He would have had to use Asiatics, and they were not as good as Greeks or Macedonians at this time. Consequently, Seleucus most likely provided a large amount of light troops.

[Spartan 666]

ok, let's stop this religion war..

@Sardaukar One: yes, Antigonus was the most powerful, because after the death of Perdiccas he was given the charge of ruler of the whole Asia, while Antipater had Europe. So he had the large majority of the Macedonian royal army, well trained and equipped troops; Seleucus, Ptolemy and Lysimachus built their armies mostly with local troops. I admit his power and intelligence, but I still hate him because he was the one to cause Antipater and Craterus to join the coalition against Perdiccas in the First War of the Diadochi.

Nice nickname, btw... DEATH BEFORE DISHONOR!

@Silver Legionary: they had to join, but Antigonus never fought on all fronts at the same time. He always managed to make peace with at least one of the other Diadochi to fight the others.

In the Fourth War of the Diadochi, in which Antigonus was defeated and killed, Cassander was forced to ask for Lysimachus', Ptolemy's and Seleucus' help but he only sent a small army in Asia. Ptolemy conquered Coele Syria, but he received a message saying that Seleucus and Lysimachus had been defeated, so he went back to Egypt. So he didn't get anything of Antigonus' kingdom after his defeat by Seleucus and Lysimachus.

[aznflea]

my favourite is antigonos monophthalmus. i would have loved it if he had united alexanders legacy, he is probably the only one who deserves to have the kingdom passed on to him. my second favorite is seleukos. antigonos III megas was brilliant, not so much as alexandros. it is a pity the seleukids lost to those damn romans.

damn it playing EB made me speak like this. i cant remember the latinised names anymore.

[Spartan 666]

You probably mean Antiochos III Megas, not Antigonos...yes, he was probably the most brilliant king after the Diadochi generation.

Antigonos Monophtalmos was smart and intelligent, it's true, but he was among the ones who started Alexandros' empire dissolution.

[death to the romans]

I agree that antigonos was the greatest.
the seleucids were stupid, taking antioch as capital while seleucia was the center
the ptolemies were weak exept for the first 3

[Spartan 666]

@ Cal20: yes, it's kind of paradox...I wanna say only a last thing: there haven't been any religion war, nor slaughters because of religion before the rise of christianity. Is that only a strange coincidence?
About Eumenes: yes, he was a brave and valid man, but he fight for an already lost cause, the unity of the Empire. He was loyal to Perdiccas and managed to delay and then kill Craterus during the First War of the Diadochi, but that was in vain since Perdiccas was murdered by his high officers (including Seleucus) in Egypt. In the Second War he caused a lot of troubles to Antigonus before being finally defeated at Gabae and then betrayed by the commander of the Argyraspides. He was very close to defeat Antigonus once and for all, but he met a miserable end, like Pyrrhus.

An historical curiosity: even if the commander of the Argyraspides, Antigenes, betrayed Eumenes, Antigonus had him burnt alive and the Argyraspides were sent as garrison in Arachosia. They were an elite unit, but they were not reliable.

@Death to the romans: Seleucus was not stupid. In the last years of his reign, he divided the Empire in two: he ruled over Asia Minor and Syria from Antioch, while his son Antiocus I Soter ruled the east from Seleucia. He was well aware of the importance of the eastern satrapies. It was only after Antiocus' death that his son, Antiochus II who was mediocre, abandoned the east to try to maintain the west.

[death to the romans]

i do not mean seleucus, i mean his succesors

[Spartan 666]

ok, but Antiocus I Soter can't be absolutely called stupid. He was a brilliant general and a smart administrator. He managed to hold together the whole Empire. The Bactrians and the Parthians started to conquer Seleucid provinces only after his death.

[Cal20]

Yes Eumenes actually beat Antigonus but it was the loss of the baggage train, most of it the Silver Shields with most of their booty built up from campaigning with Alexander not to mention their wives and childen. So they betrayed him to get it back. I didn't know he had the commander of the Argyraspides killed though! Servered him right I suppose. Apparently when he fought the battle against Craterus and Neoptolemus near the Hellespont he fought Neoptolemus himself and killed him, how fitting since i *think* Neoptolemus had betrayed Eumenes earlier.

[RedFox]

I wanna say only a last thing: there haven't been any religion war, nor slaughters because of religion before the rise of Christianity. Is that only a strange coincidence?

That is incorrect. Echnaton, a Pharaoh of Egypt introduced the first monotheistic deity Aten and forced the religion on his people, which caused major uproar and bloodshed among his people. The worship of Aten later influenced the appearance of the Jewish god Jahve (the predecessor to Christian 'god'!) which was kind of 'exported' when the Jews fled Egypt.

It was neither the first nor last religion that caused bloodshed and terror. Though it is true that the later Christian and Muslim movements were extremely radical and treated non-believers as pagans - it is still unfair to openly blame a religion for all the bad things out there.

Though I do resent the fact that Christians destroyed most of ancient relics / statues (Hellenistic statues were quite nude and thus immoral) / artefacts / scrolls. It is even suspected by some that most of the known ancient history is a fabrication of medieval monks. Though that is yet another one of those conspiracy theories.... *sigh*

If you want to live a rational life though, keep the hell away from crazy brainwashing Christians! (Or Muslims for that matter!)

[Paul d]

Antigonos Agreades was the closest one of any of them to actually rebuilding the empire. Once he died at Ipsus, the last chance for Alexander's empire to be reunited under a sole ruler was lost.

[Sardaukar One]

@ Spartan 666

Antigonus actually had to give up a fair sized amount of the royal army.
Hence the troop exchange with Antipater.
It was in Antipater's interest to get rid of the Perdiccan forces, so he gave Antigonus 10,000 Macedonians.
8,500 pikemen and 1,500 companions.
In return, Antigonus gave Antipater care of the Kings and let Antipater take the most unruly Macedonian elements in the royal army back to Macedon. Coincidentally, they gave Antipater trouble at the Hellespont before crossing over into Europe. Antipater gave them the slip, transferring the Kings, himself and the bodygaurds etc, while leaving these troops behind to be transported later.
Antigonus clearly kept the asian and mercenary elements in the royal army, and some of the Macedonian elements. A further 3,000 rebellious Macedonians had to be allowed to go back home to Macedon.
The alternative was them joining the Perdiccan forces in Asia Minor. They were certainly from the royal army. As to how many more Macedonians there were left from the royal army under Antigonus, who can say? Probably a few thousand or so.

"I admit his power and intelligence, but I still hate him because he was the one to cause Antipater and Craterus to join the coalition against Perdiccas in the First War of the Diadochi."

Perdiccas tried to do to Antigonus what Antigonus tried to do to Seleucus.
While regent, he ordered Antigonus to conquer Cappadocia for Eumenes. The only problem was that Cappadocia and its king, Ariarathes had an army of 40,000 men or so.
Leonnatos had a large force and was suppossed to help Antigonus take Cappadocia. But he left Asia Minor to help Antipater in the Lamian war.
Antigonus didn't have the troops for this on his own. Then Perdiccas ordered for him to stand trial. Presumably for disobeying orders. Its hardly suprising Antigonus bolted and agitated against him.

Also, Perdiccas only has himself to blame for war with Antipater and Craterus.
He married Antipater's daughter, then rejected her for Alexander's sister, Cleopatra.
Thats an awful move he made if he truly wanted peace. The implications for royal status cannot have been lost on Antipater and Craterus.
Eurydike wanted to marry Alexander's half witted half brother Phillip II. Perdiccas tried to stop the marriage by having Eurydike and her party arrested. But the crew he sent messed it up and Eurydike's mother was killed. It was a total debacle and the marriage went ahead anyway.


Antigonus never fought on four fronts because both he tended to concentrate on either Ptolemy or Kassander. Consequently, Kassander was never really able to take the battle to Antigonus because most of the time he was under the kosh.
The game for Antigonus was simple. Take out Kassander, and Lysimachus is finished also.
Do you really think the soldiers of Lysimachus would have been able to withstand attacks from east and west? They may well have deserted.
With Macedon and Thrace in the fold, it would not have mattered one wit what Ptolemy or Seleucus did.
They could not have beaten Antigonus at this point. He would have virtually sole access to the valued Greek mercenaries and the only access to Macedonian pikemen.
Ptolemy could easily be bottled up in Egypt via Gaza. And with control of the sea and Cyprus as a great base, the Antigonids could have picked their moment to attack Egypt.
Of course, attacking Egypt was not easy. One only has to look at Perdiccas to know that.
Ptolemy's one attempt to retake the Levant was short lived.

It took Lysimachus the first three diadoch wars to get a hold on Thrace. And he didn't have the resources to go after Antigonus on his own. Not even close.
The only reason he rolled the dice for the Ipsus campaign because his back was against the wall with Kassander's dire position in Macedon.

Antigonus had little interest in the East. Other than that no one should pose a threat to him from this direction. In which he failed miserably.
But its why he got rid of Peithon, removed Peukestas and was probably going to get rid of Seleucus. All three were popular within their provinces and with the army. Presumably he saw that anyone of them might unite the east under their own banner.

It would have been foolish for Antigonus to launch major assaults on the various dynasts. While he had resources, he didn't have those kinds of resources. Besides, he knocks out Kassander, and the rest fall like dominoes. It would just be a matter of time.
Just as it was stupid for the dynasts to launch individual attacks on Antigonus. Without the support of the other dynasts, it would ultimately be a pointless venture.

I'm only aware of Antigonus and Seleucus making peace while fighting elsewhere was going on.
Seleucus took this peace to take over the eastern satraps 308-303 BC.
Antigonus did try to cut individuals out form the herd by trying to make peace agreements with individual dynasts. He tried it with Ptolemy and with Kassander. Neither worked out.

After Ipsus, Lysimachus took Asia Minor, Seleucus was to take Syria and the Levant and Kassander's brother, Pleistarchus, was to get Cilicia. Very odd this last one, but in my book its an indication Kassander provided substantial support for the Ipsus campaign.
The Antigonid army was re-enrolled into the armies of Lysimachus and Seleucus were feasible.
Ptolemy, though part of the coalition, had failed to provide any support for the Ipsus campaign.
So he was left out of the partition by Lysimachus, Seleucus and Kassander.
During the Ipsus campaign, Ptolemy grabbed as much of the Levant as he could get his paws on while Antigonus' attention was on Seleucus and Lysimachus. Antigonus did get Ptolemy to scuttle back to Egypt by spreading the rumour he had defeated the allies. But in any event, word of Ipsus reached Ptolemy and he took much of the Levant, territory that was suppossed to go to Seleucus.
Seleucus returned to Syria to find much of what should have been his territory, in the hands of Ptolemy.
This was the basis of the Syrian wars that were to follow some 20 years later.

Demetrius was still a formidable player despite Ipsus. The Phoenician cities of Sidon and Tyre stayed loyal to him and with Cyprus and control of the seas, he was far from impotent.

[Sardaukar One]

@ Paul D

Had he won Ipsus, I think that Antigonus might well have left the East alone.

Before Gaugemala, Darius offered to cede to Alexander all of Asia west of the Euphrates. Basically what would one day become the eastern part of the Roman Empire outside of Europe.
Parmenion urged Alexander to accept. And this is considered by some to have been the territorial ambitions of Philip had he lived to invade the Persian Empire. And consequently the territorial ambitions of Antigonus.

After his monumental struggle with Eumenes, he left hostile satraps in power. Such as Strasanor in Bactria.
Though not stated in the sources, he presumably got some acknowledgment from them of his authority and he confirmed them in their positions. Antigonus could not have removed them without force. And he certainly had the resources to remove them. But it could have taken a few years at least.
Richard Bellows states that Antigonus just wasn't that interested in the east. The gains that could be made from the East just weren't worth the resources needed to hold the east down.
And I think its pretty much spot on.

"Here again Antigonus was following the model of Philip rather than of the romantic Alexander.
The latter's exploits in Bactria and India might be the stuff of legend, but they did not make strategic sense in terms of creating and running a durable empire: those regions were simply too far away from Greece and Macedon to be easily held as part of a Graeco-Macedonian empire, and they offered no advantages worth the cost of conquering and holding them. Antigonus's approach was realistic: he removed the great Persian treasuries of the east to western Asia, and for the rest simply sought to prevent any power strong enough to become a threat to him from arising in the far east. His loss of the battle of Ipsus and the subsequent establishment of Seleucus as ruler of Asia meant a return to something more closely approximating Alexander's policy."


To me, the involvement of the Seleucids in the far east was ultimately a bad mistake.
They would have been better off trying to hold onto their interests in the west.
Asia Minor was allowed to break up into the hands of a number of petty kingdoms, such as Pergamum, Pontus, Cappadocia and Bithynia(spelling?).
Asia Minor had been a gold mine for Antigonus. Its hard to imagine just what the Seleucids were thinking by not concentrating on this.

[Spartan 666]

It depends, some historians don’t agree with the traditional idea to consider 4 wars of the Diadochi.


-some consider only the first three, because at the end of the Third Alexander’s son and Roxane were killed by Cassander. So, according to them, the wars of the Diadochi are only the wars for the regency and civil wars inside the Macedonian empire which in theory was still united, because it was not until the beginning of the Fourth that each successor assumed kingship in his territories.


-the majority consider four wars, so until the death of Antigonus, who was the last one about to reunify Alexander’s empire. I totally disagree with this doctrine, since Seleucus after the battle of Corupedion was nearer to reunify the empire than Antigonus had ever been.



-other consider five wars, so including the war between Lysimachus and Seleucus, because after this war all the Diadochi were dead except Seleucus. So the wars of the Diadochi are ALL the wars fought between Alexander’s generals. Personally I support this doctrine.

Always keep in mind that Diadochi means successors, but with that word we call only Alexander’s generals, the men of his staff. Their sons and descendants like Antiochus I Soter, Ptolemy II Euregetes, Antiochus III Megas…are successors, but not Diadochi. They are the next generations of kings after Alexander’s death, and they are called Epigones (not sure on the spelling).


Then…I agree with everything you wrote, my sources say the same things so it’s useless to discuss on that. I just want to focus on Perdiccas. I agree with you that he shouldn’t have rejected Antipater’s daughter. He should have married Cleopatra, Alexander’s sister, in the first place. But this would have meant Perdiccas to enter the Argead family, thus becoming king at the expense of Arrhidaeus and of the other generals. That was the only right thing to do, but he didn’t do it to prevent revolts among the generals. The Macedonian army didn’t love Perdiccas so much, but they were simple people. If he had married Cleopatra, it’s unlikely that the army would have rebelled.