Labuhan Deli comes from the word "harbour (of Deli)"; thus the name records the period when this area was the maritime centre of the
Deli Sultanate, and thus - under the authority of the Sultanat - was a part of the history of the Deli Kingdom. During the Dutch colonial era it was a center of trade and other activities. After the independence of the Republic of Indonesia on 17 August 1945 the Deli Kingdom became part of the Deli Serdang Regency, a combination of the Deli Sultanate and the Serdang Sultanate. The subsequent rapid growth of the city of Medan as the capital of North Sumatra Province and as a center of government, trade and industry led to an expansion of the city boundaries, so that in 1974 most of the villages in Labuhan Deli District became part of the Medan City administration. The widely-separated remaining parts of the district contain what was left over after the expansion of the city, together with two much more rural villages (Telaga Tujuh and Karang Gading) in the far north of the regency. ==Villages==