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Nemrut Caldera and Eastern Anatolian Volcanoes: Fire in the Highlands

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Landscapes and Landforms of Turkey

Part of the book series: World Geomorphological Landscapes ((WGLC))

Abstract

Volcanism is one of the main actors in the formation of the Eastern Anatolian landscape. Quaternary volcanism covers a significant area in Eastern Anatolia where Holocene and historical activity have been reported. Nemrut Caldera is one of the youngest volcanoes in the region, with a small-size collapse caldera forming a spectacular landscape. Mount Nemrut is characterized by extension-related peralkaline volcanism in this well-known continental-collisional setting. Following the collapse of the Quaternary caldera, the activity continued within the caldera and at the northern fissure zone. Post-caldera activity shaping the intra-caldera region is represented by domes, lava flows and phreatic/phreatomagmatic explosions. While the products of this activity cover the eastern part of the caldera, the western half of the caldera is filled with a fresh volcanic lake. Hydrothermal activity is marked with fumaroles and hot springs in the caldera. The northern fissure zone produced the youngest effusive activity in Anatolia. Bimodal fissural activity is characterized by successive rhyolite and basalt flows. Historical and mythological records of the Nemrut volcanism are scattered in a wide historical time span. During the Quaternary, Mount Nemrut and Süphan have contributed to the gradual enclosure of Van Lake Basin. They are located on the divide separating the Van Lake Basin from the Murat-Euphrates drainage basin. Products of explosive volcanism of Nemrut Caldera filled the Bitlis and Güzeldere valleys, separating the Van Lake Basin from the Dicle-Tigris hydrosystem.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are thankful to Kevin McClain for his constructive remarks on improving the English of the manuscript. We are very grateful to Mustafa Sabri Türkay for permitting us to use his Nemrut photograph.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geological Engineering, Hacettepe University, 06800, Ankara, Turkey

    İnan Ulusoy, H. Evren Çubukçu & Erkan Aydar

  2. UMR 6266 (IDEES) CNRS Rouen University and UMR 8591 (LGP) CNRS, Paris I University, Paris, France

    Damase Mouralis

Authors
  1. İnan Ulusoy
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  2. H. Evren Çubukçu
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  3. Damase Mouralis
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  4. Erkan Aydar
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to İnan Ulusoy .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Physical Geography (LGP, UMR 8591), CNRS, Universities of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and Paris 12 U-Pec, Meudon, France

    Catherine Kuzucuoğlu

  2. Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, Turkey

    Attila Çiner

  3. Ankara University, Ankara, Turkey

    Nizamettin Kazancı

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Ulusoy, İ., Çubukçu, H.E., Mouralis, D., Aydar, E. (2019). Nemrut Caldera and Eastern Anatolian Volcanoes: Fire in the Highlands. In: Kuzucuoğlu, C., Çiner, A., Kazancı, N. (eds) Landscapes and Landforms of Turkey. World Geomorphological Landscapes. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03515-0_35

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