Constantine Samuel Rafinesque. 



were known in Kentucky; he then states that by his 

 labors the entire list for North America had been 

 increased to one thousand eight hundred and thirty, of 

 which five hundred and five are in Kentucky. Many 

 of these most certainly were not artificial constructions; 

 some were the residual products of erosion ; in short, 

 they were natural features. 



Very little of the work which Rafinesque professed 

 to have accomplished in this branch of inquiry was ever 

 printed. Such memoirs as he did present, and which 

 are listed in the bibliography accompanying this sketch, 

 possess but very little value. Indeed, the whole subject 

 has practically been developed since his day. Then, too, 

 the various earthworks were in process of exact location 

 and of description from the standpoint of the curious; 

 it has remained for a later coterie of students to ap 

 proach the question along lines which are purely scien 

 tific. There is every reason also for believing that many 

 of the mounds, which Rafinesque listed elsewhere than 

 in Kentucky, were natural elevations rather than artificial 

 works. There is no record that he ever opened a single 

 one of them, or ever dreamed that this method alone 

 could produce such valuable results as are now known 

 to attach to it. Such of these mounds as can une 

 quivocally be classed among artificial earthworks are 



