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Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey
The word "Susuhunan" is a Javanese word, it is the word that is used to refer to the Ruler of Surakarta, as far as I can ascertain, this word does not exist in Old Javanese, so it would appear to be unlikely that this word was used in reference to any ruler prior to the establishment of the Karaton of Surakarta Hadiningrat. The Karaton of Surakarta Hadiningrat was established in 1745 (or 1742) by Pakubuwana II. However, supposedly this word "Susuhunan" appears in text that was written some time prior to 1700.
To my mind there are just too many questions associated with this supposedly original comment made by G.E. Rumphius. Bearing in mind that the publication of his works, some time after his death, needed to be a commercial success, I really do think that examination of his original text would be needed to confirm some of the comments attributed to him, comments that would be of interest to a general readership.
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Alan, if you noticed my post #36 you will see that i have placed a link to this published text in the original Old Dutch. Tricky to translate, but certainly doable i suppose. If you go to this text you will see that it is a searchable database. However, searches for "Susuhunan", "Sussuhunam" and "Sussuhunan" produce no hits whatsoever. I realize that Maurice is busy and my not return to this discussion anytime soon, but i am curious where the English translation he provided came from that uses the word "Sussuhunam" and what word was actual used in the original text in it's place.
Btw, just to clarify, i am not in the least skeptical that suasa as a talismanic metal could be wide ranging. My skepticism lay in the claim that it would ever be preferred over purer gold materials.