An essential aspect in the study of Hellenistic monarchical self-representation is the extent to which it incorporated conceptions of universal rule, i.e. included references to claims of world domination. An influential research position, for example, strongly emphasises the universal claims of individual rulers in the succession of Alexander the Great and downplays an ethnic or territorial bond of these monarchies. From this perspective, the formation of the Hellenistic state system with the three great empires of the Antigonids, Seleucids, and Ptolemies and its unstable equilibrium until the intervention of Rome appears as a phenomenon that the actors had not actually intended. In this context, universalism is understood as the political unity of at least the civilised world as considered by the actors. The universal ruler was considered a mediator between the divine order and the real world, ensuring peace, prosperity, and order. In this sense, he had been obliged to conduct a policy of expansion and define the boundaries of the empire as the boundaries of the world. Universalism would have helped heterogeneous premodern empires to increase their cohesion and, thus, their stability. According to this model, universalist kings were satisfied especially when other states (kingdoms or Greek poleis) recognised their supremacy. The smaller Hellenistic kingdoms could also have expressed a limited (rather religious) version of universalism in imitation of the great monarchies.

However, such universal claims reveal parallel and complementary aspects of the concrete realisation of royal rule. Indeed, recent studies have demonstrated that it was much more diversified and often oriented to the respective local and regional contexts. The Antigonids have often been described as a "national monarchy" because of its close association with the Macedonian ethnos, while a strategy of association with local identities is also observed in many of the so-called minor monarchies of Asia Minor. To clarify the orientation of royal rule action as well as self-representation according to these local specifics, the term “pragmatic regionalism” is used here. While royal rule always sought ways to expand its power and formulated ideas of world domination in specific communication contexts (and only within these), the kings and contemporary observers accepted the contradicting reality of a Hellenistic multipolar world of states. Consequently, what recent research has identified as a characteristic of Hellenistic kingship applies here, namely that it brought with it very different forms of expression and action, each mindful of regional expectations and contexts. A reassessment of Hellenistic kingship between the poles of universal claims to rule and the de facto regional limitations, which also can be found in the sources (Kings of Syria or Asia, Egypt etc.), is therefore urgently needed with an appropriate appreciation of the tension between these two poles. However, we must be mindful of the different political and communicative contexts and establish a clear distinction between addressee-related formulations of a royal ideology and political practice.

In material culture, the universalistic ideology of Hellenistic kingship can be traced in various media, such as royal imagery, display of exotic objects, or local and regional traditions elevated to an oecumenical level. In this sense, the term “universalism” signifies the instrumentalisation of artefacts or visual arts to serve the sovereigns’ ambition for world dominion and disseminate their political propaganda. Furthermore, monuments and artworks related to the monarchs’ self-representation were recently thought to include a universalised vocabulary associated with power, prestige, and luxury. ‘Universalisation’ is therefore perceived as a de-territorialisation resulting from the loss of connection with an assumed original cultural affiliation which is ultimately withdrawn due to repeated re-appropriations and complex genealogies; elements are detached from their original context and are thereby freed from their previous cultural significance to be often reinterpreted in the context of monarchy as royal status symbols. This process, which claims to foster a globalised dynastic repertoire, is described as a counterbalance to ‘particularisation’ that constantly re-embeds local trends within an overarching “global” framework.

Hence, archaeological evidence from the Hellenistic courts is analysed as the outcome of this dynamic interplay between universal-delocalised and local-regional techniques, forms of presentation, images, and formulas. Approaching the question of Hellenistic monarchy under the lens of globalisation and network theory is suggested as a new heuristic tool, acting as an alternative to earlier “transfer studies” that derived from the post-colonial concept of acculturation. In particular, the previous, long-established interpretative schemes involved dual characterisations of royal art and iconography, such as Graeco-Egyptian, Graeco-Iranian, or Graeco-Bactrian, implicitly assuming a direct link – or even an equation – between ethnicity or identity and culture styles, commonly regarded as pure cluster-notions and distinct, stable categories. In contrast, the universalisation-particularisation model strives to overcome such dichotomies by introducing a methodology which claims to be better adapted to a multipolar, increasingly interconnected world, such as the Hellenistic, where the boundaries between cultures were blurred, since it explores interactions or exchanges on various scales and questions preconceived labels. However, it was recently claimed that cultural containers are functional categories as heuristic tools. Moreover, while re-evaluating the role of universal players in the dynastic realm, a shift of the perspective towards the meso-region was instead suggested. Despite apparent differences in the nature of the sources, a similar trajectory of scholarship emerges in historical research and archaeology.

This interdisciplinary conference serves the detailed study of royal (self-)representation in Hellenism, tracing the ideological background and manifestations of regionalism and universalism in an interdisciplinary perspective between ancient history, numismatics, and classical archaeology. Furthermore, it raises the question of how the concept of the universal or delimited rule was expressed internally and externally. Finally, it aims to examine which channels of communication, which agents (e.g., court milieu, non-human 'actors' such as coins) and which target groups can be identified as media of these ideologies.

The following guiding questions can serve to identify concrete patterns, differences, or desiderata:
- What are the central features of the Hellenistic universalism/world domination claims, and how were they communicated? In what way did this discourse and its material expression vary according to the specific historical and socio-cultural context? How were the borders of the empire and world domination perceived? How did artworks and artefacts contribute to this perception? Did the archetype of Alexander the Great influenced the formation of Hellenistic universalism, and in what way?
- Were the postulation and denial of universal claims decisively determined by a regionally or culturally defined communication context? Did regional expectations, traditions and contexts influence forms of expression and action of monarchical representation, so that the same monarch or at least the same dynasty appeared differently to different groups of addressees and in different communication or cultural contexts? Can specifics of each individual dynasty be traced in the reception of universal rule or delimited regionalism?
- To what extent were claims to world supremacy compatible with the Hellenistic de facto multipolar system? How were mutual recognition in diplomatic intercourse, dynastic marriages, and contractual agreements/announcements between kings determining boundaries or territorial changes reconciled with the presentation of a king as world ruler? Were contemporaries aware of the contradiction between universal claims and the reality of a multipolar world of states?
- Should dynastic art and architecture be understood as a result of the tension between universalisation and particularisation? Are other parameters or methods applicable? How were such connotations and phenomena perceived, appreciated, and experienced?
- Were there 'hot' periods in which claims to world domination were increasingly propagated or attempts were made to implement such claims in reality? Conversely, were there 'cold' periods in which claims to world domination were perpetuated on an ideological level but ignored in political practice? What was the reason for this in each case?
- How has historical research elaborated the concepts of universalism and regionalism in monarchies, and how has the debate developed? Are the aforementioned faces of these notions complementary and intertwined or parallel and incompatible meanings and definitions?