Hellenistic Kings and Pragmatic Regionalism: Self-Representation, Political Practice and Perception

• Applicant: Dr. Charalampos Chrysafis
• Subject Area: Ancient History
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 506077528

The research project is based on the working hypothesis that although the Hellenistic monarchies expressed universal claims in certain contexts or others attributed such claims to them, these did not directly determine their political actions. Rather, a pragmatic approach to political realities dominated, which was not contradicted by the offensive use of opportunities to expand one's own power base. Universalism is understood in this context as the political unity of at least the world regarded as civilised. This idea is traced back to the Late Bronze Near Eastern great kingdoms and is often used in research to understand pre-modern empires. The universal ruler was seen as a mediator between the divine order and the real world, with the task of ensuring internal peace, prosperity and order. In this sense, he was obliged to pursue a policy of expansion and to define the border of the empire as the border of the world. This tendency represents a reaction to older research approaches, which conceptualised the Hellenistic empires from the perspective of modern statehood and therefore, analogous to the European powers of the 18th and 19th centuries, basically perceived them as competing territorial states constituted under constitutional law, which saw themselves as part of a system of powers based on fundamental mutual recognition and regulated diplomatically. As justified as this reaction is, it cannot be overlooked that it is an extreme counter-position, which is itself fraught with a number of problems and requires further differentiation. Accordingly, it will be a task to break away from the seemingly abstract models of statehood and universalism and to ask about the concrete realisation of royal rule, which - according to the working hypothesis - was much more strongly oriented towards the respective local and regional contexts. The term "pragmatic regionalism" is used here in order to make clear the orientation of royal rule as well as of self-representation according to these local specifics: This is to express that while royal rule always sought ways to expand its own power and formulated ideas of world domination in certain communication contexts (and only in these), the reality of a multipolar world of states was both accepted and operationalised by the kings themselves and described as such by contemporary observers. Accordingly, what recent research has identified as a characteristic of Hellenistic kingship also applies here, namely that it brought with it very different forms of expression and action, each of which kept regional expectations and contexts in mind.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants