• The Journal of the Petrological Society of Korea
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.385-396
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• 2012

Jeju island is the biggest volcanic island in Korea and there are over 455 Quaternary monogenetic volcanoes, of which approximately 373 volcanoes(82.0%) are cinder cones. Other volcanic forms in the island include sharp-pointed lava cone without crater(9 volcanoes; 2.0%), shield volcanoes(27 volcanoes; 5.9%), tuff rings(17 volcanoes; 3.7%), tuff cones(3 volcanoes; 0.7%), a maar(1 volcano; 0.2%) and lava domes(25 volcanoes; 5.5%). The monogenetic volcanoes include 15 small nested cinder cones(aloreum). The monogenetic volcanoes are more abundant in the eastern part of the island than in the western part. If the main cause of the weathering such as precipitation affected the shape of the monogenetic volcanoes, more monogenetic volcanoes(BC, CC, DC, etc.) are supposed to be present in the southern part that have more precipitation than in the northern part. But the distribution of the monogenetic volcanoes shows no difference between the southern and the northern parts. So we suggest that the difference of the climatic conditions did not affect the distribution or the shape of cinder cones. Tuff rings, tuff cones and a maar are distributed beneath the island or in the low-altitude areas along the shore although cinder cones are distributed in the interior of the island. This means that the volcanic activity which formed the monogenetic volcanoes resulted from either phreatomagmatic eruption or magmatic (hawaiian or strombolian) eruptions depending on the reaction with water (underground water or shallow waters). The distribution of the monogenetic volcanoes according to the altitude shows that 253(55.6%) volcanoes occur in low-lying coastal areas at an altitude below 300 m, 110(24.2%) in a middle mountainous area at an altitude between 300~600 m and 92(20.2%) in a high mountainous area at an altitude above 600 m. So more than half of monogenetic volcanoes are distributed in low-lying coastal areas.