Volcanoes: Past and Present

by Edward Hull

Fig. 24.—Extinct Craters in the Jaulân, north-east from the Sea of Galilee, called Tell Abû en Nedâ and Tell el Urâm, with a central cone.—(After Schumacher.)

Another remarkable volcano is the Tell Abû en Nedâ ([Fig. 24]). This is a double crater, with a cone (probably of cinders) rising from the interior of one of them. The highest point of the rim of one of the craters reaches a level of 4042 feet above the sea. A lava-stream issues forth from Abû en Nedâ, and unites with another from a neighbouring volcano.

Tell el Ahmâr is a ruptured crater of imposing aspect, reaching an elevation of 4060 feet, and sending forth a lava-current, which falls in regular terraces from the outlet towards the west and north.

The ruptured crater of Tell el Akkasheh, which reaches a height of 3400 feet, has a less forbidding aspect than the greater number of the extinct volcanoes of this region, owing to the fact that its sides are covered by oaks, which attain to magnificent proportions along the summit. Numerous other volcanic hills occur in this district, but the most remarkable is that called Tell el Farras (the Hill of the Horse). It is an isolated mountain, visible from afar, and reaches an elevation of 3110 feet, or nearly 800 feet above the surrounding plain. The oval crater of this volcano opens towards the north, and has a depth of 108 feet below the edge, with moderately steep sloping sides (17°-32°), while the slope of the exterior, at first steep, gradually lessens to 20°-21°. These slopes are covered with reddish or yellowish slag. The above examples will probably suffice to afford the reader a general idea of the size and form of the volcanoes in this little known region.

It has been stated above that the great lava-floods have probably been poured forth intermittently. The statement receives confirmation from the observations of Canon Tristram, made in the valley of the Yarmûk.[8] This impetuous torrent rushes down a gorge, sometimes having limestone on one side and a wall of basalt on the other. This is due to the fact that the river channel had been eroded before the volcanic eruptions had commenced; but on the lava-stream reaching the channel, it naturally descended towards the valley of the Jordan along its bed, displacing the river, or converting it into clouds of steam. Subsequently the river again hewed out its channel, sometimes in the lava, sometimes between this rock and the chalky limestone. But, in addition to this, it has been observed that there is a bed of river gravel interposed between two sheets of basalt in the Yarmûk ravine; showing that after the first flow of that molten rock the river reoccupied its channel, which was afterwards invaded by another molten lava-stream, into which the waters have again furrowed the channel which they now occupy. The basaltic sheets descend under the waters of the Sea of Galilee on the east side, and were probably connected with those of Safed, crossing the Jordan valley north of that lake; owing to this the waters of the Lake of Merom (Huleh) were pent up, and formerly covered an extensive tract, now formed of alluvial deposits.

(d.) Land of Moab.—Proceeding southwards into the Land of Moab, the volcanic phenomena are here of great interest. Extensive sheets of basaltic lava, described as far back as 1807 by Seetzen, and more recently by Lartet and Tristram, are found at intervals between the Wâdies Mojib (Arnon) and Haidan. On either side of the Mojib, cliffs of columnar basalt are seen capping the beds of white Cretaceous limestone, while a large mass has descended into the W. Haidan between cliffs of limestone and marl on either hand.

Around Jebel Attarus—a dome-shaped hill of limestone—a sheet of basaltic lava has been poured, and has descended the deep gorge of the Zerka Maïn, which enters the Dead Sea some 2000 feet below. This gorge had been eroded before the basaltic eruption, so that the stream of molten lava took its course down the bed of this stream to the water's edge, and grand sections have been laid bare by subsequent erosion along the banks. Pentagonal columns of black basalt form perpendicular walls, first on one side, then on the other; while considerable masses of scoriæ, peperino, and breccia appear at the head of the glen, probably marking the orifice of eruption. Other eruptions of basalt occur, one at Mountar ez Zara, to the south of Zerka Maïn, and another at Wady Ghuweir, near the north-eastern end of the Dead Sea. There are no lava-streams on the western side of the Ghor, or of the Dead Sea.[9]

The outburst of the celebrated thermal springs of Callirrhoë, together with nine or ten others, along the channel of the Zerka Maïn, is a circumstance which cannot be dissociated from the occurrence of basaltic lava at this spot. In a reach of three miles, according to Tristram, there are ten principal springs, of which the fifth in descent is the largest; but the seventh and eighth, about half a mile lower down, are the most remarkable, giving forth large supplies of sulphurous water. The tenth and last is the hottest of all, indicating a temperature of 143° Fahr. Thus it would appear that the heat increases with the depth from the upper surface of the table-land; a result which might be expected, supposing the heated volcanic rocks to be themselves the source of the high temperature. To a similar cause may be attributed the hot-springs of Hammath, near Tiberias, and those of the Yarmûk near its confluence with the Jordan. Some of these and other springs break out along, or near, the line of the great Jordan-Arabah fault which ranges throughout the whole extent of this depression, from the base of Hermon to the Gulf of Akabah, generally keeping close to the eastern margin of the valley.

(e.) The Arabian Desert.—The basaltic lava-floods occupy a very large extent of the Arabian Desert, from El Hisma (lat. 27° 35' N.) to the neighbourhood of Mecca on the south, a distance of about 440 miles, with occasional intervals. The lava-sheets are called "Harras" (or "Harrat"), one of which, Harrat Sfeina, terminates about ten miles north of Mecca. The lava-sheets rest sometimes on the red sandstone, at other times, on the granite and other crystalline rocks of great geological antiquity. In addition to the sheets of basalt, numerous crater-cones rise from the basaltic platform at a level of 5000 feet above the sea, and two volcanic mountains, rising far to the west of the principal range, called respectively Harrât Jeheyma and H. Rodwa, almost overlook the coast of the Red Sea.[10]