Nagorno-Karabakh is located in the southern part of the Lesser Caucasus range, at the eastern edge of the Armenian Highlands, encompassing the highland part of the wider geographical region known as Karabakh. Under Russian and Soviet rule, the region came to be known as Nagorno-Karabakh, meaning "Mountainous Karabakh" in Russian. The name Karabakh itself (derived from Persian and Turkic, and meaning "black vineyard") was first encountered in Georgian and Persian sources from the 13th and 14th centuries to refer to lowlands between the Kura and Aras rivers and the adjacent mountainous territory. Following the collapse of Soviet Union, most of this area came under the control of the Artsakh Republic, which had economic, political, and military support from Armenia but has been internationally recognized as a part of Azerbaijan. As a result of the 2020 war, all surrounding territories and some areas within Nagorno-Karabakh were taken back by Azerbaijan, yet the final status of the region is still a subject of negotiations between Russia, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Ancient history The region of Nagorno-Karabakh, located between the Kura and Araxes rivers, was once occupied by the people known to modern archaeologists as the Kura-Araxes. Little is known about the ancient history of the region, primarily because of a scarcity of historical sources. Jewelry has been found within the present confines of Nagorno-Karabakh inscribed with the cuneiform name of Adad-Nirari, King of Assyria (c. 800 BCE). The first mention of the territory of modern Nagorno-Karabakh is in the inscriptions of Sardur II, King of Urartu (763–734 BC), found in the village of Tsovk in Armenia, where the region is referred to as Urtekhini. There are no additional documents until the Roman epoch. By the beginning of the Hellenistic period the population of Nagorno-Karabakh was neither Armenian nor even Indo-European, and it was Armenized only in the aftermath of Armenian conquest. Robert Hewsen does not exclude the possibility of the Armenian Orontid dynasty exercising control over Nagorno-Karabakh in the 4th century BC, however, this hypothesis is disputed by many other scholars, who believe the extent of Orontid Armenia was limited to the vicinity of Lake Sevan. Similarly, Robert Hewsen in his earlier work and Soviet historiography date the inclusion of Nagorno-Karabakh into Armenia to the 2nd century BC. Legend of Aran According to local traditions held by many people in the area, the two river valleys in Nagorno-Karabakh were among the first lands