TITICACA, te'tit-kiitkii, LAKE. The largest lake in South America (Map: America, South, C 4). It is situated on the boundary of Peru and Bolivia, being about equally divided between the two countries. It lies in a large and lofty lacustrine basin inclosed between the main Andean range and the Cordillera Real, with cross ranges on the north and south. This basin has an average elevation of 13.000 feet, and the surface of the lake itself lies about 12.500 feet above the sett The lake has a length of 130 miles with an average breadth of 30 miles. It is divided by promontories into three unequal parts, and contains several islands. The depth in some places reaches 700 feet. but large portions of it are shallow, and the shores, especially in the south, are lined with marshy tracts covered with reeds. The vegetation along the shores is otherwise scanty. and the surround ing country is bleak and treeless. The lake re ceives a number of streams from the surround ing mountains and discharges through the Desa guadero into Lake Aullagas, whose waters finally evaporate in the great salt marshes in the south ern part of the closed basin. In former ages the
lake occupied the whole of the basin. Its sur face stood then much higher, and it discharged eastward into the Amazon. The region around Lake Titicaca was one of the seats of early In dian civilization, and contains many interesting architectural remains. sonic of which antedate the bleat' periods. The most imposing of the ruins are those of Tialmanaco (q.v.). (See PERUVIAN ANTIQUITIES; PERUVIAN ARCILE ()LOGY.) The lake was formerly navigated only by crude Indian rafts, but since the opening of a railroad to Arequipa and the Pacific Coast steamboats have plied on it. Constilt: Pentland, Thr Laguna de Titicaca (London, 1848) Pro ceedings of the -1111eriCall Academy of Arts and Sciences (Philadelphia, 1876).