An excavated trading settlement in the mangrove behind the mouth of the Deli, on the strait shore between the Barumun and the Asahan.
The digging (E. Edwards McKinnon, 1970s; from memory) found Chinese stoneware, glass and beads, Tamil inscription fragments, Buddhist and Hindu statues and a wooden jetty, and gives it a working life from about the eleventh or twelfth century to the fourteenth. No text names it. Who ruled it, and whether it was the sea door of the kingdom later called Haru (Aru), is not known: the name Haru is not attested before the Yuan record of 1282 and 1295.
It is the best physical picture of what a working strait port looked like at this date. The Chinese and Tamil communities that its finds imply have their own record.
Who holds it
- Name
- not known: no source names a chief
- Title
- Lord or headman of Kota Cina: the excavated trading settlement behind the Deli mouth
- Since
- not known
- Born
- not known
- Family
- not known
- Confidence
- low
Lord in 1200
not known: no source names a chief
How things stand that morning
Working, on the archaeological dating, if the site was still in business on 1 January 1200. No chief, council or garrison is named.
Council
No headman, judge or council is named in any source.
Communities
The finds point to Chinese and Tamil traders and to Buddhist and Hindu worship. No headman, quarter or temple is named in any text.
Fairs and markets
None known; trade follows the monsoon.
Militia
No source.
Walls and castle
A wooden jetty (excavated). No wall or citadel is attested.
Trade and crafts
Imports shown by the finds: stoneware, glass and beads. What went out is not shown; forest goods of the Batak and Karo uplands are the likely return (our inference, not a source).
Places of note
- Labuhan Deli (the river mouth): The mouth of the Deli on the strait; the settlement lay inland in the mangrove, behind it.
Where the sources disagree
- The campaign board says 'Chinese stoneware by the ton'; no weight is given here because we found no excavated figure. The campaign board also says 'secure': the site is secure, its name, ruler and dependence are not.
Evidence: Fair for the existence of a trading port in the twelfth century (excavation, dated by its ceramics); nothing at all for who ruled it or what it was called.
"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.
Primary sources for Malay ports
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.
- The Leiden grants of Rajaraja I and Kulottunga I concerning the Srivijaya vihara at Nagapattinam, The Chola chancery (Rajaraja I, Rajendra I, Kulottunga I) (the Larger plates about 1005 to 1014 (completed under Rajendra I); the Smaller plates 1090). Background documents for the relations between the Cholas and the Malay world. Read online
- The Grahi (Chaiya) Buddha inscription and the Tambralinga records, Various (the officers of Grahi and the kings of Tambralinga), edited by George Coedes (the Chaiya bronze Buddha inscription 1183; the Nakhon Si Thammarat records 13th century; edited 1929, revised 1961). The peninsula in 1200 has one near-contemporary dated text: the Old Khmer inscription on the base of a bronze Buddha from Wat Hua Wiang at Chaiya, dated 1183, which records the image's casting by order of the mahasenapati Galanai, governor of Grahi, under the king Srimat Trailokyaraja Maulibhusanavarmadeva, a name that is argued to be either a Malayu (Srivijaya) overlord or a local king.
- 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
- 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
- E. E. McKinnon, Kota Cina: its context and meaning in the trade of Southeast Asia in the twelfth to fourteenth centuries (1984), read from memory, not rechecked
- Wikipedia (English): Aru Kingdom
- OMNIA board note (a lead only, checked against the sources above)
Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.