The Javanese speech levels have received considerable attention from linguists and lexicographers, but little has been written about a very specialized speech style used exclusively among the upper members of the priyayi elite, who once defined standard Javanese usage. Within the highest male priyayi circles of Yogyakarta and Surakarta (= Solo) a special was use, known the latter city as basa kedhaton, the former more generally as basa bagongan. Names, forms and uses of palace language have varied from locale to locale and from time to time, but one basic contextual feature crucially and consistently defined palace language: it was exchanged among courtiers when speaking the presence of the king formal audience, and/or at his behest. A common Javanese phrase referring to this place--ing ngarsa dalem, in the royal presence--connotes a conception of ruler as locus of power and definer of an area within which special modes of behavior are obligatory. 1 In this respect, palace language is a special manifestation of a particular ideology of kingship and politics. What follows is intended as a supplement to Poedjosoedarmo's wordlist of nonngoko vocabularies, together with a very broad and somewhat tentative characterization of palace usage. 2 Palace language is set off from the everyday speech levels by the same types of features through which non-ngoko and ngoko speech are distinguished, and the palace language forms can be divided into subclasses functionally analogous to various subsets of the everyday speech level wordclasses. For this reason, the basic Javanese metalinguistic vocabulary presented Poedjosoedarmo's description of the speech levels can and will be used here, accordance with the definitions and descriptions he provides. 3 Difficulties dealing with palace language stem from its double marginality. First, crucial distinguishing marks setting it off from everyday speech are found for only a small number of lexical/morphemic contrasts. Second, palace language 1. The area within which palace language was obligatory (and so the royal presence) was defined very precisely terms of the location and purpose of a given audience. Four such types of audience are distinguished the Serat Wewaton Tata-krama, Pisungsungipun Radbn Ngab~hi Jayadarsana Kaliwon Ganrdhbk saking mara sepuh RadOn Ngabbhi Ranggawarsita (Surakarta: Mesiom Radyapustaka ms. # 74, Javanese character catalog).