Demetrius I of Macedon

Demetrius I of Macedon (337 to 283 BC), known as Poliorcetes, a surname meaning the Besieger of Cities, was a Macedonian Greek nobleman and military leader of the Antigonid dynasty, the son of Antigonus I Monophthalmus and the first of his family to rule Macedon. After ousting the governor Cassander had placed in Athens in 307 BC, he destroyed the naval power of Ptolemaic Egypt at the Battle of Salamis in 306 BC and conquered Cyprus, after which his father took the title of king and gave it to him as well. His long and unsuccessful siege of Rhodes in 305 BC earned him his nickname and showed his use of enormous siege engines. He and his father were beaten by a coalition of the Diadochi at the Battle of Ipsus in 301 BC, where Antigonus was killed, yet Demetrius took Athens again in 294 BC and became king of Macedon until Pyrrhus and Lysimachus drove him out in 288 BC. He surrendered to Seleucus I and died in captivity in Cilicia in 283 BC. He is remembered as a pioneer of large scale siege warfare and logistics.