Kraton and the Sultanate in Yogyakarta

Part of the Yogyakarta travel guide — see every topic in All Yogyakarta Guides.

Yogyakarta is formally a Special Region, and its head of government is the Sultan, currently Hamengkubuwono X. This is a genuine constitutional arrangement, not a ceremonial survival: the province is the only one in Indonesia whose governor is not elected but inherited, a settlement that dates from the Sultanate's decisive support for the republic during the independence struggle, when Yogyakarta briefly served as Indonesia's capital. The Kraton — the palace complex at the southern end of Malioboro — is where all of that is anchored.

The palace complex

The Kraton was founded in 1755 and is less a single building than a walled city of pavilions, courtyards and banyan trees, still inhabited by the royal family and staffed by abdi dalem, court servants in traditional dress who work for a nominal salary as a matter of duty. The public section opens in the morning and closes early, around one or two. Guides are included with the ticket and are usually abdi dalem themselves, which makes the tour far more interesting than the museum cases. Entry is around 15,000 rupiah plus a camera fee, and modest dress is expected.

The cosmological axis

The palace sits on a straight line running from Mount Merapi in the north, through the Tugu monument, down Malioboro, through the Kraton, to Panggung Krapyak and on to the Indian Ocean. This axis is the organising idea of the whole city — a symbolic path between the volcano and the sea, between the spiritual north and the Queen of the Southern Sea — and UNESCO inscribed it as a World Heritage property in 2023. Once you know it is there, the layout of Yogyakarta stops looking accidental. Walking or cycling the axis is one of the better ways to spend a morning.

Performances and court arts

The Kraton maintains gamelan orchestras, classical Javanese dance, wayang kulit shadow puppetry and macapat sung poetry, and stages short performances in the palace pavilions on a weekly rotation, usually in the morning and included in the entrance ticket. These are rehearsals and court practice as much as shows, which is precisely what makes them worth catching. For a full-length wayang kulit — traditionally an all-night performance — Sonobudoyo Museum next to the northern square runs a condensed two-hour version most evenings.

Around the Kraton

The northern square, Alun-Alun Utara, holds two sacred banyan trees; the local tradition is to walk blindfolded between them, which almost nobody manages. The southern square has the same trees and, in the evening, a carnival of light-covered pedal cars. Taman Sari, the ruined eighteenth-century water castle, is a ten-minute walk west. The Kotagede district to the south-east was the earlier Mataram capital and is now the silversmithing quarter. Sonobudoyo Museum holds the best collection of Javanese artefacts in the country outside Jakarta and is routinely overlooked.

Kraton and the Sultanate at a glance

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