Ararat, Mount

Mount Ararat (Agri Dagi), Turkey. The largest and highest volcano in Turkey, Mount Ararat lies near the Armenian and Iranian borders. Its highest peak, Great Ararat or Buyuk Agri Dagi, towers 5,165 m/16,945 ft above sea level.

Sheep grazing below Mount Ararat (Agri Dagi), Turkey. It is common for sheep to be grazed on the mid-flanks of the volcano and in the alluvial and volcanic plains below. The 5,165 m/16,945 ft high volcano is located near the borders with Armenia and Iran.

Double-peaked mountain in Turkey near the Iranian and Armenian borders; Great Ararat, at 5,137 m/16,854 ft, is the highest mountain in Turkey; Little Ararat rises to 3,925 m/12,877 ft. Based on a misreading of the Old Testament (Genesis 8:4), it was believed to be the resting place of Noah's Ark after the Flood. The tradition that Mt Ararat was the site of the Ark's landing was based on the line, ‘upon the mountains of Ararat’, which actually indicates a country or region.

A US expedition ascended the mountains in 1949 in an unsuccessful search for evidence of Noah's Ark. Other, more recent expeditions have found timbers that some believe to have come from the Ark. At the northern foot of Great Ararat in Armenia there is a large monastery associated with the belief that Noah's Ark rested here. From the 1990s, the area around the mountain was the scene of fighting between Turkish forces and Kurdish separatist guerrillas.