HUANUCO, a mountainous department of central Peru, bounded on the north by Libertad and San Martin, east by Loreto, south by Junin, west by Lima and Ancachs. Area, 15,43o sq.m.; pop. (estimated, 1927), 200,000, largely Indian. It includes sierra and wooded eastern slopes of the Cordillera and is traversed from south to north by the valley of the Huallaga river and the upper Maranon. Cotton, sugar-cane, coffee, rice, cacao, coca and other tropical crops are grown in the valleys. Posuso, a German colony, is on a tributary of the Pachitea. The enormous mineral resources are little exploited. The only finished road connects Cerro de Pasco with the city of Huanuco, a distance of 62 m. The road to Puerto Leguia on the Pachitea, is finished (19 28) only as far as the Puente de Rancho across the upper Huallaga, 18 m. below the capital. Huanuco, capital of the department, in a beauti ful valley on the left bank of the Huallaga river, is about 8,000 ft. above sea-level. Pop., 192o, about 6,000. The town was founded in 1539 by Gomez Alvarado and was an important colonial centre. Huanuco is celebrated for its fruits, the chirimoya (Anon clieri molia) of this region being the largest and most delicious of its kind.