Preservation of The Old City of Semarang, Central Java, Indonesia, and its development as a cultural tourism asset

Abstract

This article contains the discussion of the history and the preservation of The Old City of Semarang. The Old City was founded at the end of 17th century after an agreement was approved by the Mataram Kingdom and the Vereeniging van Oost-Indische Compagnië (VOC) in 1678. Later on, the colony of VOC developed into a little city surrounded by a fortress in which VOC leaders, its officers, VOC soldiers, European traders resided. Here, some town facilities were built such as municipality house (stadshuis), shops, roads, soldier barracks, warehouses, schools, hospital, church, court, prison, and municipality park. Around the third decade of the 19th century, the fortress of VOC colony was demolished since this city was massively developed. Today, this little city built by VOC is called “Semarang Old City” or “De Oude Stad” (in Dutch), and the municipal government of Semarang is eager to protect and develop this cultural heritage site as a tourism cultural asset due to its unique values and typical cultural attractions. The purpose of this study is to support the Semarang City Government’s plan to propose The Old City of Semarang to UNESCO in order to get recognition as a World Heritage.