The building came to serve as a memorial through an act of family duty. Diponegoro's heir, Raden Ayu Kanjangteng Diponegoro, transferred the property to the Yogyakarta government, signing a transfer letter witnessed by Nyi Hadjar Dewantara and Kanjeng Raden Tumenggung Purejodiningrat. From mid-1968 through 19 August 1969, a monument was constructed on the pringgitan -- the semi-enclosed hall that adjoins the pendopo, the open-sided reception pavilion at the complex's center. Major General Surono, then Commander of the Military District, initiated the project, and President Suharto inaugurated the completed site. The name Sasana Wiratama translates from Javanese as "place for soldiers," an acknowledgment that this was not merely a museum about one man but a memorial to the broader struggle he led.

Passing through the entrance gate, visitors encounter a two-meter wall shaped to resemble the dome of a mosque. Its upper portion bears a painted scene of a giant opposing a dragon -- a sengkalan memet, a Javanese chronogram that encodes a date within its imagery. The scene spells out the Javanese phrase Butho Mekso Basuki ning Bawono, which corresponds to the Javanese year 1825 -- the onset of the Diponegoro War. This method of marking time through symbolic imagery rather than numerals is a distinctly Javanese tradition, and its placement at the museum's threshold makes the entrance itself a historical statement. Before visitors see a single artifact, they have already crossed through the date that defines everything inside.

The museum's collection of roughly one hundred items draws heavily from Diponegoro's paramilitary forces, and the weapons reveal how broadly the resistance drew its fighters. Alongside conventional arms -- lances, keris daggers, swords, arrows -- the collection includes a bandil (iron hammer), a patrem (a weapon designed for women fighters), and a candrasa, a sharp implement disguised as a chignon pin and used by women who served as spies. The variety speaks to a guerrilla war fought not by a professional army but by a cross-section of Javanese society. Two sacred weapons command particular reverence: Kyai Omyang, a keris with 21 curves forged by an empu during the Majapahit era, and a sword from the Demak Kingdom. Both are believed to hold the power to ward off disaster. Their presence links Diponegoro's nineteenth-century rebellion to a martial tradition stretching back centuries.

Not everything in the Sasana Wiratama involves combat. The collection also preserves eighteenth-century household tools made of brass: betel containers with their kecohan (spittoons for the residue of betel-chewing), canting holders used in batik-making, bringsing pots, and various forms of kacip -- the specialized implements for slicing areca nut. These objects reconstruct the domestic world that Diponegoro's followers inhabited when they were not fighting. A small statue of Ganesha, a pair of loro Blonyo foundation statues, and decorative lamps add ceremonial texture. Parts of a gamelan set once owned by Sultan Hamengkubuwono II, crafted in 1752 -- including percussion instruments and wilahan bonang made of wood, copper, and brass -- connect the museum's collection to the broader Yogyakartan court culture from which Diponegoro emerged.

In front of the museum on H.O.S. Cokroaminoto Street stand two statues that extend the site's memorial mission beyond the Diponegoro War. On the east side, Lieutenant General Oerip Soemohardjo faces outward, his pedestal inscribed with the French military maxim Orde. Contre-Ordre. Desordre! -- a warning about the chaos that follows contradictory commands. On the west side, General Sudirman stands with the simpler Indonesian admonition Jangan Lengah: "Don't be inattentive." Both men were heroes of the Indonesian War of Independence more than a century after Diponegoro's time, and their placement at his museum draws a deliberate line of continuity -- from a Javanese prince who fought the Dutch in 1825 to the republican generals who finally ended colonial rule in the 1940s.