(Πατροκλῆς).
1. A Macedonian general in the service of Seleucuis I., king of Syria, by whom he was appointed to command at Babylon, soon after he had recovered possession of that city, B. C. 312.
On the advance of Demetrius, Patrocles being unable to face that monarch in the field, withdrew beyond the Tigris, whither Demetrius did not think fit to follow him. (Diod. 19.100.) Of his subsequent operations in that quarter we know nothing. His name next appears as one of the friends and counsellors of Seleucus in the war against Demetrius, B. C. 286 (Plut. Demetr.47): and again in 280, after the death of Seleucus, we find him entrusted by Antiochus I. with the chief command of his army, and the conduct of the war in Asia. (Memnon. 100.15, ed. Orell.) We are also told that Patrocles held, both under Seleucus and Antiochus, an important government over some of the eastern provinces of the Syrian empire, including apparently those bordering on the Caspian Sea, and extending from thence towards the frontiers 3f India. (Strab. ii. pp. 69, 74.)