Battle of Ipsus - Aftermath

Aftermath

From the wreck of the Antigonid army, Demetrius managed to recover 5,000 infantry and 4,000 cavalry, and escaped with them to Ephesos. Despite the expectation that he would raid the Epehesian treasury, Demetrius instead immediately set sail for Greece "putting his chief remaining hopes in Athens". However, he was to be disappointed; the Athenians had voted not to allow any of the kings into Athens. Concealing his wrath, he asked the Athenians for the return of his ships that were moored there, and then sailed on to the Isthmus of Corinth. He found that everywhere his garrisons were being expelled, and his erstwhile allies defecting to the other kings. He left Pyrrhus of Epirus (at that time was part of the Antigonid faction) in charge of the Antigonid cause in Greece, and himself sailed to the Thracian Chersonesos.

The last chance to reunite the Alexandrine Empire had already been passed when Antigonus lost the Babylonian War and two thirds of his empire. Ipsus confirmed this failure. As Paul K. Davis writes, "Ipsus was the high point of the struggle among Alexander the Great’s successors to create an international Hellenistic empire, which Antigonus failed to do." Instead, the empire was carved up between the victors, with Ptolemy retaining Egypt, Seleucus expanding his power to eastern Asia Minor, and Lysimachus receiving the remainder of Asia Minor. Eventually Seleucus would defeat Cassander and Lysimachus (in 281 BC), but he was assassinated shortly afterward. Ipsus finalized the breakup of an empire, which may account for its obscurity; despite that, it was still a critical battle in classical history and decided the character of the Hellenistic age.