The Kura-Araxes culture or the Early trans-Caucasian culture, is a civilization that exists from 3400 BC until about 2000 BC.

The earliest evidence for this culture is found on the Ararat plain; thence it spread to Georgia by 3000 BC, and during the next millennium it proceeded westward to the Erzurum plain, southwest to Cilicia, and to the southeast into an area below the Urmia basin and Lake Van, down to the borders of present day Syria.

Altogether, the early Trans-Caucasian culture, at its greatest spread, enveloped a vast area approximately 1000 km by 500 km.

The name of the culture is derived from the Kura and Araxes river valleys.

Its territory corresponds to parts of modern Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Chechnya, Dagestan, Ingushetia and North Ossetia.

It may have given rise to the later Khirbet Kerak ware culture found in Syria and Canaan after the fall of the Akkadian Empire.