A Royal Fascination Revealed: King Rama V’s Visits To Java And His Batik Collection

King Chulalongkorn (Rama V, r. 1868-1910) made three visits to the Indonesian island of Java in 1871, 1896 and 1901. Although the King purchased batik textiles on the first and last trips, it is likely that the majority of his purchases date from his longest and most extensive visit in 1896.  Fortunately, not only have notes and diaries of each trip survived in the National Archives of Thailand, but, even more miraculously, over 300 batik textiles belonging to King Rama V have been preserved in the treasury of the Inner Court of the Grand Palace.Geographically they primarily represent the court-dominated style of the Central Javanese Principalities and the Indo-European style of Java’s North Coast. In 1897 some of His Majesty’s batiks were briefly displayed in Bangkok, but none have been exhibited or published since.

This presentation will briefly describe the reasons for, and extent of, each of King Rama V’s trips to Java where he was warmly greeted by local rulers and Dutch officials. Using published and archival records of the King’s itinerary and his diaries, this paper will discuss where, when, and possibly from whom, some of the pieces in the collection were acquired. In addition, many of the batiks have handwritten tags in Thai and English (and sometimes Dutch) indicating the place of purchase, the name of the pattern and the price. The presentation will highlight a substantial group of pieces from the European batik entrepreneur, Mrs. J. Jans of Pekalongan, which considerably adds to the body of her known work, as well as several pieces that can be attributed to the workshop of the famous atelier of Carolina von Franquemont, others to the Jonas workshop in Surakarta and the Yogyakarta workshop of Wilhelmina van Lawick van Pabst.