Mangkunegaran Bureaucracy’s Policy on Royal Dress Code Change of The 20th century

Abstract

Clothing has both personal and social meaning. In Javanese society, it reflects social status. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the clothes a person wore could reveal his status as a noble, priyayi, or kawula. The political and social significance of clothing is reflected in Java's rulers' policies regarding the dress code for royal officials. This study describes the Mangkunegaran bureaucracy's policies on changing the royal dress code in the early twentieth century. This study was designed using the historical method, which includes several steps such as determining the theme, heuristics, source criticism, interpretation, and writing. As data sources, the study used the Rijkblad collection at the Reksa Pustaka Library of Mangkunegaran and the Vorstenlanden Laboratory managed by the History Studies Program at the Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Sebelas Maret University. The results reveal that, at the beginning of the twentieth century, Mangkunegaran issued policies regarding changes in the royal dress code in the government bureaucracy. The policy of changing the royal dress code is an expression of Mangkunegaran dynamism and openness to changing times, which was dominated by Western modernity at the turn of the twentieth century.