| xenolith (zěn'ə-lĭth', zē'nə-) A rock fragment foreign to the igneous mass in which it occurs. Xenoliths usually become incorporated into a cooling magma body when pieces of the rock into which the magma was injected break off and fall into it. Compare xenocryst. |
rock fragment within an intrusive igneous body that is unrelated to the igneous body itself. Xenoliths, which represent pieces of older rock incorporated into the magma while it was still fluid, may be located near their original positions of detachment or may have settled deep into the intrusion, if their density is greater. Xenoliths can be contrasted with autoliths, or cognate xenoliths, which are pieces of older rock within the intrusion that are genetically related to the intrusion itself. The general term for all such incorporated bodies is inclusions. Xenoliths are usually reconstituted through the processes of contact metamorphism, in which heat and fluids cause mineralogic and chemical changes in the parent rock of the xenolith; a study of these changes can give information on the temperature and composition of the magmatic body