The Biggs site (15Gp8), also known as the Portsmouth Earthworks Group D, is an

Adena culture The Adena culture was a Pre-Columbian Native American culture that existed from 500 BCE to 100 CE, in a time known as the Early Woodland period. The Adena culture refers to what were probably a number of related Native American societies sharing ...

archaeological site An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology an ...

located near South Shore in

Greenup County, Kentucky Greenup County is a county located along the Ohio River in the northeastern part of the U.S. state of Kentucky. As of the 2020 census, the population was 35,962. The county was founded in 1803 and named in honor of Christopher Greenup. Its cou ...

. Biggs was originally a concentric circular embankment and ditch surrounding a central conical

burial mound Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...

with a causeway crossing the ring and ditch. It was part of a larger complex, the

Portsmouth Earthworks The Portsmouth Earthworks are a large prehistoric mound complex constructed by the Native American Adena and Ohio Hopewell cultures of eastern North America (100 BCE to 500 CE). The site was one of the largest earthwork ceremonial centers const ...

located across the

Ohio River The Ohio River is a long river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing southwesterly from western Pennsylvania to its mouth on the Mississippi River at the southern tip of Illino ...

, now mostly obliterated by agriculture and the developing city of

Portsmouth, Ohio Portsmouth is a city in and the county seat of Scioto County, Ohio, United States. Located in southern Ohio south of Chillicothe, it lies on the north bank of the Ohio River, across from Kentucky, just east of the mouth of the Scioto River. ...

. (author confused Biggs as being Group C, when it is in actuality Group D)

Description

The site was surveyed and mapped by

E. G. Squier Ephraim George Squier (June 17, 1821 – April 17, 1888), usually cited as E. G. Squier, was an American archaeologist, history writer, painter and newspaper editor. Biography Squier was born in Bethlehem, New York, the son of a minister, Joel S ...

in 1847 for inclusion in the seminal archaeological and anthrolopological work ''

Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley ''Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley'' (full title ''Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley: Comprising the Results of Extensive Original Surveys and Explorations'') (1848) by the Americans Ephraim George Squier and Edwin Hamilton ...

''. They described the earthwork as being a causewayed embankment high by wide encircling a ditch deep and across. They encircled an area in diameter. In the center of the ditch was a conical tumulus high and in diameter.

Gallery

File:Biggs Mound or Portsmouth Earthworks Group D.jpg, Squier and Davis illustration of the Biggs site File:Portsmouth Works Group A B C D Squier and Davis 01.jpg, Squier and Davis map with Group D or the Biggs site File:Portsmouth Earthworks Groups A B C D HRoe 2022 600px.jpg, Scale aerial illustration of the Portsmouth Earthworks

References

External links

Black and white photo of site, Jan 23, 1939, The William S. Webb Museum WPA/TVA Photograph Archive

Working with the EM38 Earth Conductivity Meter: Geophysical Survey at the Hopeton Earthwork, Chillicothe, Ohio, May, 2001

Scioto Historical : Portsmouth Earthworks Tour
Adena culture Archaeological sites in Kentucky Buildings and structures in Greenup County, Kentucky 1847 archaeological discoveries Native American history of Kentucky {{US-archaeology-stub

Description

Gallery

See also

References

External links