Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary
According to "Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary" the town's name comes from the nearby village Shushikent (called "Shosh" in Armenian), which literally means "Shusha village" in the Azerbaijani language. Conversely, the Armenian historian Leo considered it more likely that the village Shosh received its name from the fortress, which he considered the older settlement.