The mouth of the Brantas and the busiest water in Java.
The Kamalagyan plate of Airlangga (Saka 959, 1037; also called the Kelagen plate) says the Waringin Sapta dam was thrown across the river to save the rice fields and to keep the boats running down to the port at Hujung Galuh; the plate also speaks of drawing foreign merchants. Janggala was the eastern half of Airlangga's partition of about 1045; Jayabhaya's Hantang plate (1135) celebrates its defeat, and since then the delta is Panjalu's. About 1225 the Chinese list the port among Java's dependencies (Hirth and Rockhill's Jung-ya-lu; the English Wikipedia page on Surabaya gives Zhongjialu, 重迦庐, and calls it the earliest historical record of the place).
The channels shift and no medieval quay has been found, so the dot stands for the delta. The city of Surabaya and its date of 1293 are not yet.
Who holds it
- Title
- Harbour chief (juru) at the Brantas mouth, answering to Daha
- Since
- not pinned
- Born
- not known
- Confidence
- low
No name for 1200. The port is named in the Kamalagyan plate (Saka 959, 1037) and in the Chinese lists of about 1225.
Lord in 1200
A juru answering to Daha, name not known; the Kediri king holds the delta since Jayabhaya's victory.
Overlord
Kertajaya
What the town holds
- The Brantas mouth and its channels (the Porong arm to the south)
- Landing, warehouse and market dues
- The crossing to Madura at Arosbaya and Kamal
How things stand that morning
A working delta port under Kediri; no event dated.
Threats
- Channel shift and silting
- Floods (the dam of 1037 was built against them)
Charter
None known; the Kamalagyan plate is about the dam and the port.
Council
Not known: the port officers, the banyaga merchants and the foreign groups.
Communities
Javanese merchants (banyaga), foreign groups named by origin in the charters (recalled), Chinese shipmasters in the season.
Fairs and markets
Not recorded.
Militia
Not recorded.
Walls and castle
None found.
Trade and crafts
Everything the interior grows comes down to it and everything the eastern islands send west is landed to be broken up and sold on (the campaign board's phrase): rice, salt, pepper, cloth, spices, sandalwood; no figures.
Places of note
- Porong channel: The southern arm of the delta, the way down when the northern channel silts.
- Madura strait crossing: Narrow water crossed at Arosbaya in a morning.
Where the sources disagree
- The campaign board entry janggala-surabaya-delta labels the delta 'Janggala (Hujung Galuh)'. Janggala is a name for the region (Airlangga's eastern half), not a kingdom of 1200.
- Surabaya as a city (31 May 1293 by the city's convention) and its crocodile and shark etymology are later and folk (en.wikipedia).
Evidence: A plate of 1037 and a Chinese list of about 1225 name it; nothing of 1200.
"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.
Primary sources for Kediri
Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.
- History of Song, chapters 488 and 489: Jiaozhi, Dali, Champa, Zhenla, Pagan, Srivijaya, Java, Brunei, Chola and Tambralinga, Toqto'a (Tuotuo) and the Yuan history office, from the Song court records (1343 to 1345, from Song veritable records and court diaries). The Chinese court's record of its southern neighbours, compiled from Song archives. Read online
- History of the Song, the chapters on Xia and on foreign states, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office (1343 to 1345). The Song court's accounts of its neighbours, each arranged as an annal of embassies and wars. Read online
- Old Javanese Charters (the Brandes and Krom corpus), including the Kediri inscriptions of Kamesvara and Srngga, Various (the Kediri kings and their officers), edited by J. L. A. Brandes and N. J. Krom (inscriptions of the 8th to 15th centuries; edited 1913). Kediri (Panjalu) in 1200 is known from a few royal charters on stone and copper, which this corpus first printed: the records of Kamesvara (about 1182 to 1194) and of Srngga, that is Kertajaya (from about 1194 to 1222), among them the Kamulan charter of 1194 and the Palah (Panataran) record of 1197, with the king's titles, his seal, the officials of the court and the villages freed from tax.
- A Description of the Foreign Peoples (Records of Foreign Nations), Zhao Rukuo (Zhao Rugua) (1225 at Quanzhou). The best single text for the island world around 1200, written by the superintendent of maritime trade at Quanzhou from merchants' reports a generation after the date. Read online
- Notes in Answer to Questions about the Lands beyond the Passes, Zhou Qufei (周去非) (1178, after service in Guangxi). A Guangxi official's notes, written twenty years before 1200, on the south-western frontier of the Song and the countries beyond. Read online
- Description of the Foreign Peoples (Chau Ju-kua), Zhao Rukuo (趙汝适) (about 1225, while superintendent of maritime trade at Quanzhou). The Song customs officer's survey of the overseas world, compiled from merchants and from Zhou Qufei, a generation after 1200 but describing trade routes that were the same in 1200. Read online
- The Description of the Country, called the Nagarakretagama, Mpu Prapanca (1365 at the Majapahit court). A Majapahit court poem of 1365 listed here only for its retrospect. Read online
Sources and studies
- Wikipedia (en), Airlangga (read in this pass): Wringin Sapta dam 1037, Calcutta stone 1041, partition 1045, Belahan
- Wikipedia (en), Surabaya (read in this pass): Zhu Fan Zhi 1225 as the earliest record (Zhongjialu), Hujung Galuh, the 1045 partition
- Wikipedia (en), Zhu Fan Zhi (read in this pass): Zhao Rukuo, about 1225, Hirth and Rockhill 1911
- Hirth and Rockhill, Chau Ju-kua: his work on the Chinese and Arab trade (1911), chapters Sin-t'o (p. 70) and Shê-p'o (p. 75); the full text would not open in this pass, so every statement from it is recalled and marked
- Wikipedia (fr), Royaume de Kediri (read in this pass): list of plates Ngantang 1135, Talan 1136, Padelegan II 1159, Kahyunan 1161, Angin 1171, Jaring 1181, Ceker, Galunggung 1194, Kamulan 1194, Palah 1197, Wates Kulon 1205; quotes Zhou Qufei's ranking of Java
- General knowledge of Old Javanese and Old Balinese epigraphy and the archaeology of Java, recalled and not re-read in this pass (Boechari, Poerbatjaraka, Soekmono, Bernet Kempers)
- OMNIA board notes for the place (a lead, not a source)
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.