Incorporating Multistaged Geophysical Data into Regional-scale Models: a Case Study from an Adena Burial Mound in Central Kentucky EDWARD R. HENRY 1 * , NICOLAS R. LARACUENTE 2 , JARED S. CASE 3 AND JAY K. JOHNSON 4 1 Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St Louis, St Louis, MO 63130, USA 2 Department of Anthropology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA 3 Halliburton (Gulf of Mexico Division), Lafayette, LA, USA 4 Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Mississippi, University, MS 38677, USA ABSTRACT A multistaged geophysical methodology was recently used at site 15Ck10, a state-protected Middle Woodland period Adena (500 BCE to CE 250) conical burial mound in Central Kentucky, USA. Data from this research are used to develop anthropological interpretations on the nature of burial mound construction and regional interaction between separate mortuary traditions in Kentucky. Methods utilized in this research include magnetic gradiometry, electromagnetic induction, ground-penetrating radar, electrical resistivity tomography and downhole magnetic susceptibility. Together, these methods helped identify a circular ditch-and-embankment earthwork enclosing the burial mound, as well as possible off-mound activity areas commonly reported in the Adena literature. Within the mound, multiple anomalies were discovered that are consistent with hypothesized geophysical responses of mound stages and funerary features. A review of burial mounds excavated by the University of Kentucky during the depression-era work relief programmes (i.e. the Works Progress Administration – WPA) of the 1930s and early 1940s provide a vehicle with which to interpret these features. Comparisons of our data with length and width dimensions of known mortuary facilities documented in WPA excavations suggest that two distinct burial types were used at 15Ck10. These data are used to build a compre- hensive site interpretation and create a relative dating context for the site. We use the site-level model to evaluate regional interaction on Kentucky’ s Middle Woodland social landscape. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Key words: archaeological landscapes; multistage geophysics; burial mounds; eastern North America Introduction The construction of elaborate geometric earthen enclo- sures and complex burial mounds in the Middle Ohio Valley during the Early (1000–200 BCE) and Middle (200 BCE to CE 400) Woodland periods represents one of the most impressive displays of prehistoric social complexity and ritual activity in eastern North America. In Kentucky, archaeologists have identified and explored the intensification of highly variable mortuary rituals dating between 500 BCE to CE 250, re- ferring to the phenomena as ‘Adena’. A decentralized, ‘heterarchical’, form of sociopolitical organization that emerges only during periods of population aggrega- tion has been hypothesized as one explanation for variability in Adena mortuary ritual (Abrams and Le Rouge, 2008; Henry, 2013). A situational form of leadership complements the mobile nature of Adena societies that archaeologists have devised from ephemeral settlement patterns (Applegate, 2013; Clay, 1998). This conceptualization of Adena social interac- tion implies that a dynamic and constant reshaping of the ideologies behind Adena ritual practice may have occurred at both site and regional scale. Thus, the investigation of mound construction and ritual practices at particular mortuary sites could pro- vide an understanding of how Adena ritual ideologies change through time. Further, sites situated in spaces * Correspondence to: E. R. Henry, Department of Anthropology, Washington University in St Louis, St Louis, MO 63130, USA. E-mail: edward.henry@wustl.edu Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Received 2 August 2013 Accepted 28 December 2013 Archaeological Prospection Archaeol. Prospect. 21, 15–26 (2014) Published online 4 February 2014 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/arp.1474