In 1836 William Hamilton identified the site of Amorium and provided the first description of the ancient ruins. "We reached the deserted and dreary site of what was once a populous city...Near the centre of the valley in which the ruins are situated... is an insulated hill about half a mile in circumference on which may still be traced a portion of the walls of an Acropolis... The principal part of the town is to the S. and S.W. of the Acropolis... These ruins...appear chiefly to date from the early Byzantine or Christian period... marking the existence of one of those large and important towns which were destroyed in this part of Asia Minor by the irruptions of the Saracens and the Seljuki...