Geology and nature of Mount Ararat: reading a volcanic massif

Two volcanic cones on one base

Türkiye’s official tourism portal describes the massif as two major volcanic cones, Greater Ağrı and Little Ağrı, rising from a base about 35 km across. It gives 5,137 m for Greater Ağrı and 3,896 m for Little Ağrı. The Ağrı Governorship adds that the Serdarbulak plateau and Little Ağrı lie on the eastern side of the main mountain.

Nineteenth-century observers described the same pair from the north. Friedrich Parrot, who reached the summit in 1829, placed Great Ararat to the north-west and the smaller cone to the south-east, their summits about seven miles apart by his colleague Fedorov’s measurement. James Bryce’s 1878 account names Sardarbulakh as the starting point of climbs up the south-eastern face; the Governorship’s Serdarbulak plateau carries the same name in Turkish spelling.

What the rocks are

The Governorship’s mountain page summarises the rock sequence in one sentence: basalt up to about 4,000 m and andesite lavas above. The Brockhaus and Efron encyclopedia, published in Russia between 1890 and 1907, names andesite and trachytic porphyry as the dominant rocks.

Two points of caution follow from the sources themselves:

• These are general descriptions for a public audience, not a geological map. Neither source gives sample locations, ages or a map of rock units.
• A general statement that lavas change with height does not tell you what rock or surface lies on a particular slope. For map-based reading, use the official map-reading guide.

Is Ararat an active volcano?

The tourism portal calls the summit a dormant volcanic cone. That word describes the scientific status of the volcano; it is not a forecast and not a hazard bulletin. This reference has not yet been able to verify eruption dates against a dedicated volcanological database, so it does not state when Ararat last erupted. The appendix to the 1846 English edition of Parrot’s book already noted that local historians recorded earthquakes but no eruption.

The 1840 catastrophe

The best-documented natural disaster on the mountain happened in 1840. The appendix to Journey to Ararat describes a violent earthquake on 20 June 1840 (the appendix does not say whether the date is Old or New Style). Loose stone, snow, ice and mud fell from the great chasm and buried the monastery of St James, where Parrot had stayed in 1829, together with the village of Arghuri and the summer residence of the sardar. James Bryce, who visited in 1876, placed this chasm on the steep north-eastern side of the mountain.

The Brockhaus and Efron encyclopedia records the same event briefly: the monastery of St Jacob and the neighbouring village of Arkhuri were destroyed in 1840 by an earthquake and mud flows from Ararat. It describes the valley of St Jacob, on the north side, as a deep volcanic fissure where rock is exposed to a great depth.

The different spellings (Arguri, Arghuri, Arkhuri) refer to one village; see the terminology index.

Ice on the summit

GoTürkiye describes the summit as covered with glaciers and calls it the largest permanent ice mass in Türkiye. Satellite-based figures published by the U.S. Geological Survey show that the ice has been shrinking: 8.9 km² in 1977, 6.3 km² in 2004 and 5.3 km² in 2013, with most of the loss on the southern, western and eastern sides.

These are area measurements for particular years. They do not describe snow cover, crevasses or surface conditions on any given day. The full series, together with older snow-line observations, is on the page snow and ice on Mount Ararat.

Vegetation belts

Ararat’s rise from the Aras plain to its ice cap produces distinct vegetation belts. The Brockhaus and Efron encyclopedia notes that these belts are clearly expressed on Ararat and that the change of vegetation with height was first studied scientifically there by Tournefort at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Its description runs from cotton and rice fields, gardens and vineyards at the foot, through deciduous woods, especially birch, and shrubs to alpine grasses up to the snow line.

That description is more than a century old. It is historical evidence of how naturalists saw the mountain, not a survey of vegetation or land use today. The Governorship’s current page speaks more generally of grassland and mountain meadows reaching up to the snow line.

Protected status

According to GoTürkiye, the mountain was declared a national park in 2004. The sources consulted for this page do not describe the park’s boundaries, managing office or rules. Anyone who needs those details should obtain them from Türkiye’s nature conservation authority and read them together with the current permits and access information.

What this page does not tell you

• It does not assess volcanic, rockfall or glacier hazards for a trip.
• It does not describe current snow, ice or route conditions.
• It does not replace official maps, forecasts or instructions from the competent authority.

Sources

1. GoTürkiye, Mount Ararat (Ağrı Dağı) in Ağrı. Checked 14 September 2026.
2. Ağrı Valiliği, Ağrı Dağı (page dated 14.09.2020, citing İ. Alpaslan, Her Yönüyle Ağrı, 1995). Checked 14 September 2026.
3. Friedrich Parrot, Journey to Ararat, translated by W. D. Cooley, New York: Harper and Bros., 1846, including the appendix “Partial fall of Ararat”. Internet Archive. Read 14 September 2026.
4. James Bryce, Transcaucasia and Ararat, 3rd ed., London: Macmillan, 1878. Internet Archive. Read 14 September 2026.
5. «Арарат, горы», Энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона (1890–1907). Wikisource. Read 14 September 2026.
6. USGS EROS Center, RBV Images Mount Ararat. Checked 14 September 2026.