Battle dress

"Your handmaidens are trained to protect you. Let me show you."
"I want to be trained too."

―Captain Panaka and Queen Padmé Amidala, as the latter viewed her handmaidens' battle dresses^[2]

Battle dresses were clothing worn Monarch of Naboo and her handmaidens to engage in combat.^[3] During Padmé Amidala's reign as the Queen of Naboo, they were worn as training uniforms by her handmaidens. When Captain Quarsh Panaka, the leader of Amidala's security forces, suggested that she observe her handmaidens during their combat training, Amidala decided to participate by disguising herself in the same maroon and gold training uniform.^[2]

During the invasion by the Trade Federation, the handmaidens' battle dresses were worn by Amidala and four of her handmaidens while the Queen's decoy, Sabé, wore the royal red and black battle dress.^[1]

Amidala wore a maroon battle dress for another skirmish on her homeworld when she was the Senator of Naboo during the Clone Wars.^[4]

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Behind the scenes

Battle dresses were created for the 1999 prequel trilogy film, Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace.^[1] The costumes were first identified as battle dress in the junior novelization, written by Patricia C. Wrede and released May 3 of the same year.^[3] The designs were conceptualized by artist Iain McCaig and the finished costumes were realized by costume designer Trisha Biggar and her department. McCaig's initial concept featured straps across the belly, but they were removed from subsequent concepts as they would be awkward and uncomfortable to wear in reality.^[5]

Hasbro created an action figure^[6] and a doll of Sabé in her battle dress, though the latter's packaging purported to be one of Queen Amidala herself.^[7] They also created multiple action figures of Padmé in hers.^[8]^[9]^[10]