Regent of the Macedonian Empire, 319 - 317 B.C.
Polyperchon was a general under Philip II and Alexander the Great. Following the First War of the Diadochi, he was governor in Macedonia while Antipater tried to assert his regency over the whole empire. In 319 B.C., Antipater made Polyperchon his successor as regent, passing over his own son, Kassander. A civil war soon broke out between Kassander, supported by Antigonus and Ptolemy and Polyperchon, allied with Eumenes. In 317 B.C., Kassander drove Polyperchon out of Macedonia and took control of the mentally disabled King Philip III Arrhidaeus and his wife Eurydice. Polyperchon fled to Epirus, where he joined Alexander's mother Olympias, his widow Roxana, and his infant son King Alexander IV. Together Olympias and Polyperchon invaded Macedonia. An army commanded by Philip III immediately defected and Philip and his wife Eurydice were murdered. Soon after, however, the tide turned, Kassander was victorious, Olympias was executed, and the boy King Alexander IV, and his mother Roxana were captured (both would be killed in 310 B.C. to secure Kassander's rule). Polyperchon surrendered the regency to Antigonus, but the empire was already forever divided. Polyperchon is last mentioned as being alive in 304 B.C. but may have lived into the early 3rd century B.C.