[Gustav]

Alan, once more, thank you very much.

I am sorry, but I must return to this, and I wont have time to write anything else till Sunday evening:

"This is where the problem arises, because it seems probable that the comic nature of the wayang panakawans did not arise until wayang golek was replaced by wayang purwa in the 15th century in Demak, the replacement occurred because of Raden Patah's prohibition that applied to the wayang golek puppets."

Wayang Golek is a material and construction type, in this case of a puppet. Other types with puppets involved are, for example, Wayang Kulit, Wayang Klitik. There are other Wayang material and construction types where puppets aren't involved, like Wayang Beber, Wayang Topeng, Wayang Wong.

Wayang Purwa is a certain part of repertoire, not a material or construction type. And Wayang Purwa is the old, classical part of repertoire, as it contains Hindu mythology. Other important part of Wayang repertoire is Wayang Gedog (Panji cycle), Damarwulan cycle, many Babad, and there are many lesser known, like Wayang Calonarang, Wayang Cupak, Wayang Jayaprana.

So Wayang Golek isn't repertoire, it is just a puppet construction type, and of classical ones - Kulit, Klitik and Golek - ist is clearly the youngest one.

Wayang Kulit is mentioned already in Arjunawiwoho, 11th cent. It is possible that Wayang Beber, consisting of pictorial scrolls, and some kind of Wayang involving human actors or dancers existed at that time or even earlier.

Wayang Klitik and Wayang Golek are not known on Bali (except for some modern and short-lived experiments), so in analogy to certain features of Keris we can say, they didn't exist in Hindu Java. Their formation started probably only in 17th cent., but there are some hints which indicate, that Wayang Klitik could be older, possibly from 16th cent. The main repertoire played with Wayang Klitik figures are Damarwulan, which is historically placed Majapahit, but was created most probably in 16th cent., and Panji cycle (Wayang Gedog), which is historically placed in 12th cent. but certainly is younger then Wayang Purwa and is linked with Chinese influence.

The main repertoire played with Wayang Golek figures are Babad Cirebon, which consists of stories dealing with Islamisation of Cirebon (outside of Cirebon replaced with Babad Jawa, which deals with Javanese history from Islamisation in 16th cent. till Diponegoro war) and Babad Menak, which deals with adventures of Amir Hamza, uncle of Prophet Mohammed, as well as Panji cycle and very seldom Damarwulan.

I have a quite good library about Wayang, and have never read about existence of Wayang Golek puppets before 17th cent. If a place of origin of Wayang Golek is mentioned, it's always West Java (Cirebon). The Methode of construction is known from Chinese puppet theatre, the repertoire played with these figure deals mostly with younger history and Islamic tales.

The oldest existing Wayang Kulit and Wayang Klitik puppets date from 17th cent., but there are no known Wayang Golek figures from that time.

So - Raden Patah in 15th cent. couldn't replace a puppet construction type called Wayang Golek (which even wasn't invented at that time) with repertoire called Wayang Purwa (which deals mostly with Hindu Mythology and was well known even prior to Majapahit) - as it isn't possible to replace puppet with story. You can replace only puppet with puppet or story with story.

And the comic element in nature of Panakawan is shown on structures which well predate Raden Patah, and in stories which aren't part of Ramayana.