Lysimachus

Born to Thessalian nobility around 360 BC, Lysimachus served as one of Alexander the Great's personal bodyguards through the campaigns in Persia and India. When Alexander died in 323 BC, Lysimachus was awarded Thrace. He joined the coalition that brought down Antigonus at Ipsus in 301 BC and claimed Lydia, Ionia, Phrygia, and the northern coast of Asia Minor from the wreckage. By 288 BC he had driven Demetrius from Macedon and taken the throne for himself. But in 284 BC, at the urging of his third wife Arsinoe II—who wanted her own son to inherit—he executed his eldest son Agathocles for treas…