The peci or songkok is a cap widely worn in Indonesia, Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore, the southern Philippines and southern Thailand, mostly among Muslim males. It has the shape of a truncated cone, almost always made of black or embroidered felt, cotton or velvet. It is ordinarily worn with the traditional outfit for men. It is also worn by male in formal situations such as wedding feasts, funerals or festive occasions such as the Muslim Eid ul-Fitr and Eid al-Adha and came to be associated with Islam in Malaysia.
The origin of the songkok can be traced to the the fez, which was adopted by the Ottomans in 1830 and subsequently spread to South Asia from where it was introduced to the Malay Archipelago. One Brunei newspaper account erroneously states that the songkok became a norm in Maritime Southeast Asia around the 13th century with the coming of Islam in the region.[1] The earliest written mention of the word songkok is in Syair Siti Zubaidah (1840).[2]
The Malay Regiment have been using the songkok as part of their uniform since under British rule.[3]
In Malaysia and Indonesia, the songkok has become the national headdress with secular nationalist connotations made popular by Sukarno. In Indonesia it is not known as songkok, but as peci. In Malaysia, traditional Malaysian men's attire consists of a songkok, shirt, matching pants, and waist wrap that is called a baju melayu. In a Dewan Undangan Negeri or in Dewan Rakyat, a member is required to wear the songkok in order to comply with the dress code of the assembly. Thw Songkok was used to be worn during the Ottoman Empire and n some part of Africa.
On 19 June 2008, DAP assemblyman Gwee Tong Hiang was thrown out of the Johor assembly hall for not complying with the dress protocol to wear official attire, including a songkok.[4]