Records of Uplistsikhe first appear in written sources from the 7th century. Noteworthy is Vakhushti Bagrationi's account: "Above Ashuriani is Uplistsikhe, on a rocky hill jutting from the Kvernaki, by the bank of the Mtkvari, which was first built by Uplos, son of Kartlos, and was a town until Genghis; now it is shattered. But its building is strange, hewn from the rock: great chambers, sculpted from the very rock; a tunnel bored and cut down to the Mtkvari, a great one. On the west it has a high cliff, and in it many great carved caves, but now they cannot be entered. Here... there appear, as if issuing forth, hosts of spearmen and bowmen, horsemen on campaign; they take this for divination and call it Uplistsikhe."