Berle is better able than I am to give the basic details and variations found in Kentucky sites occupied during these centuries (e.g. Clay 1986, 1991). It appears, as in Ohio, variations among sites are due to differences in space and time, as measured in human generations. The geographic spread of the classic “Adena” mounds in Kentucky is similar to that of the Ohio Hopewell. The Robbins Mounds were in Boone County across from the Miami rivers (Webb and Elliot 1942). The well known Wright Mounds and the Fischer Site were some 50 miles away in a different geographic environment (Webb 1940, Webb and Haag 1947). Still farther east the C and O Mounds were in the drainage of the Big Sandy that forms part of the boundary between Kentucky and West Virginia (Webb 1942). More modern field work has added data to the overlap in chronological time and in similarities of ritual cultural materials including classic Hopewell copper ear spools (Richmond and Kerr 2005, Applegate and Mainfort 2005). But, I am limiting my examples of “Hopewell” sites in Kentucky to the one that shares a relatively unique attribute of Ohio Hopewell: extensive enclosures with complex ground plans (Greber and Horn 2010).
I am assuming the extensive earthworks at Portsmouth that continue into Greenup County Kentucky were at least in part, constructed and actively used during the Middle Woodland Time period. Today they are not mentioned in professional archaeological publications or discussions, or in communications for the general public as frequently as the extensive Newark Earthworks are. Enclosures, mounds, and walled-ways at Portsmouth have not been subjected to the same intensive studies. However, they have been affected by the same types of modern land uses: farming and urban constructions. The site lies at the confluence of the Scioto and Ohio rivers. It extends for about eight miles along the Ohio. Embankments and mounds occur both north and south of the Ohio River. Tremper Mound and its relatively small enclosure are nearby, northwest and across the Scioto (Holt 1878).