High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Urartu (natively Biai, Biainili; Assyrian: m?t Urar?u (ma-at U-ra-ar-?u), corresponding to Ararat, or Kingdom of Van was an Iron Age kingdom centered around Lake Van in the Armenian Highland.Strictly speaking Urartu is the Assyrian term for a geographical region, while the "kingdom of Urartu" or the "Biainili lands" are the Iron Age state that arose in that region. That a distinction should be made between the geographical and the political entity was already pointed out by König (1955).