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- Report: Abstracts from the 2018 Caddo Conference in Idabel, Oklahoma
Authors: Amanda L. Regnier
Abstract: The 2018 Caddo Conference was held March 8-10, 2018 at the Museum of the Red River in Idabel, Oklahoma. Fifty attendees registered for the conference. The conference began with a reception at the museum on Thursday evening. On Friday, the program included eight papers and presentations covering archaeological work in Texas and Oklahoma and a longer presentation on the rebuilding of the Caddo house at Caddo Mounds State Park in Texas. A poster session was also held on Friday afternoon. Conference attendees were given a tour of the collections housed at the museum, which include a large collection of Caddo vessels and objects from all over the world. Friday ended with dances by the Metro Oklahoma City (OKC) Caddo Culture Club, beginning with the Turkey Dance and a delicious barbecue dinner held at the museum. On Saturday, the eight presentations covered sites in Arkansas and Oklahoma, Spiro iconography, and included a presentation on the Spiro exhibit forthcoming at the Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. Just before breaking for lunch on Saturday, Caddo Culture Club and Metro OKC Caddo Culture Club members led a song using the large drum on exhibit in the museum.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:35:32 PST
- Current Research: Spiro and Caddoan Connections on the Northern Frontier
of Southwest Missouri
Authors: Jack H. Ray
Abstract: Excavations during the construction of Table Rock Lake in the late 1950s resulted in a proposition that there was a colonization of peoples into the upper White River drainage from Caddoan areas to the southwest (Chapman 1980; Chapman et al. 1960). This colonization, which resulted in the formulation of the Loftin phase, is widely accepted today (O'Brien and Wood 1998; Perttula 1983, 1989; Sabo and Early 1990). Later, James Brown (1984) exposed the myth that the southwestern Ozarks was a cultural enclave that lagged behind Mississippian developments in other parts of the Trans-Mississippi South.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:35:24 PST
- Current Research: Analysis of Ceramic Vessel Residues from the Washington
Square Mound Site (41NA49) for Evidence of Peyote use by the Caddo in the
13th-15th centuries A.D.
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula et al.
Abstract: In 2012, Perttula requested permission from to the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma's Repatriation Committee to analyze small samples (ca. 1-2 grams of ceramic paste, or sherds ca. 1-2 square centimeters in size) from the paste of five vessels from Features 31 and 95 at the Washington Square Mound site (41NA49) (Perttula et al. 2010) in East Texas to identify residue traces of the Caddo's use of peyote in the 13th-15th centuries A.D. The Caddo Nation of Oklahoma gave their permission to conduct these ceramic vessel residue studies.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:35:15 PST
- Current Research: Archiving our History, Publishing Results: Current
Research at the Arkansas Archeological Survey's Henderson State
University Research Station
Authors: Mary Beth D. Trubitt
Abstract: At the Arkansas Archeological Survey's Henderson State University (HSU) Research Station, we continue to inventory curated artifact collections. The research station has been on the HSU campus in Arkadelphia since 1967, and our collections include artifacts, photographs, maps, and field and lab records from projects as well as artifact donations from local residents. Field notes and lab forms have been scanned and archived on the server, and we are in the process of scanning the station's collection of 14,000 color slides. Assisted by volunteers, we have been inventorying artifacts, updating station databases, and submitting site revisit forms to the Registrar's Office. This inventory project has spurred new research and efforts to disseminate results of older field investigations.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:35:07 PST
- Current Research: Building a Corpus of Crockett Curvilinear Incised
Vessels
Authors: Duncan P. McKinnon
Abstract: As presented in an earlier report (McKinnon 2018), I have been compiling, with the help of several Caddo researchers, a comprehensive multi-state database of Caddo vessels (now close to 15,000). The on-going goal is to evaluate landscape scale social interactions and interregional relationships using this growing ceramic database. Some initial explorations have been productive in evaluating relationships between proposed Caddo communities (archaeological phases) and I suggest that these exercises have offered insights into Caddo interaction, identity, and ideological exchange in a visual and (continually) comprehensive way (McKinnon 2011, 2016).
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:34:59 PST
- Current Research: Renewing Research on Holman Springs (3SV29), A Caddo
Saltworks in Western Arkansas
Authors: Carl G. Drexler et al.
Abstract: The Holman Springs site (3SV29) lies in western Sevier County, Arkansas, near the Oklahoma border. It is, along with Bayou Sel (3CL27), one of two major excavations of Caddo saltworks that has not been substantially reported. Excavated between 1984 and 1986 by the Arkansas Archeological Society during their annual Training Program digs, the collections remain at the Arkansas Archeological Survey's research station (ARAS) at Southern Arkansas University (SAU) in Magnolia.The collections lay dormant for many years. Then, in 2015, the station staff revived the project and started moving it towards completion. This is a daunting challenge, given the massive size of the collection (estimates for the ceramics alone run to 4,000 pounds of sherds). We detail some of the efforts that have been taking place.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:34:50 PST
- Current Research: Organic Residues on Engraved Vessels from Ancestral
Caddo Sites in East Texas
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula
Abstract: In the course of recently documenting ancestral Caddo ceramic vessels from sites dating to Late Caddo period Titus phase contexts (ca. A.D. 1430-1680) in East Texas, specifically on sites in the Big Cypress Creek and Sabine River basins, I have encountered a significant number (ca. 9.6 percent) of more than 1790 engraved fine ware vessels that have an exterior organic residue (Table 1), including carinated bowls, compound bowls, jars, bowls, and even bottles. In some cases, the exterior residue on certain carinated bowls and compound bowls is so thick that the engraved design is obscured and almost completely covered with the organic residue (Figure 1a- c). If engraved fine wares from ancestral Caddo sites were used in daily life for the serving of foods and liquids, how did they accumulate an exterior carbonized residue by the time they were placed in burials as funerary offerings'
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:34:42 PST
- Current Research: Discovery and Recovery of a 14th Century Dugout Canoe on
the Red River, Caddo Parish, Louisiana
Authors: Jeffrey S. Girard et al.
Abstract: In June 2017, Jenna Bradley and Robert Cornett were boating down the Red River in northern Caddo Parish, Louisiana, when they noticed an unusual log protruding from a sandy bank near the town of Belcher. After realizing that it was a dugout canoe, they contacted the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, and eventually word of the find was transmitted to state archaeologist Chip McGimsey at the Louisiana Division of Archaeology. The following day, Bradley and Cornett led Jeffrey Girard and Jameel Damlouji of the Louisiana Archaeological Society to the site. It was obvious that it was a dugout canoe of comparable size and form to one found in 1983 at the base of a steep cutbank on the east side of a now cut off channel of the Red River approximately 12 km (7 miles) downstream. At the time, the 1983 canoe was thought to be the largest prehistoric watercraft in the Southeastern United States measuring 9.35 m (or 30 ft. 8 inches) long and 56 cm (1 ft. 10 inches) in diameter. The newly discovered canoe is a little larger, measuring 10.2 m long (33.4 ft.) and approximately 60 cm (2.0 ft.) in diameter. Both boats have similar shapes with step-like seats carved into the ends, and both probably are made from cypress logs, although the wood of the recent find has not been identified with certainty.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:34:32 PST
- An Ancestral Caddo Site (41CS125) on the Sulphur River at Lake Wright
Patman, Cass County, Texas
Authors: Julian A. Sitters et al.
Abstract: ln December 2017, AmaTerra Environmental lnc. conducted an intensive archeological survey of 41CS125, a previously reported ancestral Caddo site at Lake Wright Patman in Cass County, Texas. The work was done at the request of the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers, Fort Worth District in advance of a proposed bank stabilization pro}ect. The site was occupied from the Late Paleoindian period through historic times with extensive occupations during the Formative to Early Caddo and Late Caddo periods. Artifacts recovered in the investigations included both arrow and dart points, lithic debitage, bifaces, ground stone, a celt fragment, pitted stone, ceramic sherds, a ceramic bead, charred organic material, unidentified bone fragments, and 19th century historic domestic materials. While the site has been adversely affected through alluvial erosion and looting, survey results indicate that intact components of the site still exist along the northern and western periphery of the landform.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:34:23 PST
- In Between Two Worlds: Past Perspectives on the Neosho Phase (A.D.
1400-1650)
Authors: Paige Ford
Abstract: The Neosho phase (A.D. 1400-1650) in northeastern Oklahoma, northwestern Arkansas, southwestern Missouri, and southeastern Kansas represents Late Pre-contact peoples engaged in widespread trade from the Plains to groups in the southeastern United States. The phase has confounded researchers since its de.ftnition, although debates mainly concern one of two main questions concerning the identity of Neosho peoples: origins and cultural af.ftliation. Most research to date has focused simply on the question of emergence. Early in these debates, Orr (1946) suggested that Neosho peoples represented one or more plains-oriented groups that had migrated into the area, while Wyckoff (1980) and others later argued that Neosho represented a dissolution of the Arkansas River Valley Caddo- Mississippian system. Numerous issues have inhibited progress in defending either of these models, including a dependence upon research methods that rely upon descriptive cultural trait lists, a reluctance to contextualize and emplace Neosho peoples within the region at large, and even the initial de.ftnition of the phase and culture area. This article represents the beginning stages of my dissertation research and will focus on discussion of the Neosho phase, including previous research, issues and debates, and ways to resolve and reinvigorate research in this area and time period.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:34:15 PST
- A Preliminary Comparison of Two Caddo Mound Sites in Southwest Arkansas
Authors: Mary Beth D. Trubitt
Abstract: Previous Arkansas Archeological Survey excavations at the Hedges site in the Ouachita River valley and the Hughes site in the Saline River valley uncovered evidence of burned structures adjacent to the mounds. An overview of the artifact analyses indicates that the sites were roughly contemporaneous, with intensive use by ancestral Caddo Indians during the Late Caddo period, between the AD 1400s and 1600s. This presentation summarizes the research .ftndings to emphasize comparisons in timing, activities, and community plans.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:34:07 PST
- Caddo Pottery from Eight Sites in the Middle Ouachita River Valley
Authors: Mary Beth D. Trubitt
Abstract: Documentation and analysis of ceramic vessels in the Joint Educational Consortium's Hodges Collection has focused on reconstructing grave lots based on notes left by amateur archeologist Vere Huddleston in the 1930s and 1940s. Despite problems with the data, we can glean useful information from this collection. Here, l describe Caddo pottery and other artifacts in grave lots from eight sites in Clark and Hot Spring counties of west-central Arkansas. l then order the grave lots in time based on stylistic and technological characteristics (seriation) to re.ftne the ceramic chronology of the Middle Ouachita River valley and compare mortuary assemblages through time and across space.
PubDate: Fri, 01 Mar 2019 05:33:58 PST
- New Radiocarbon Dates from the Sanders Site (41LR2), Lamar County, Texas
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula
Abstract: Recent archaeological investigations at the West Mound at the Sanders site (41lR2), on the Red River in Lamar County, Texas, disclosed substantial archaeological deposits associated with a burned clay floor to an ancestral Caddo structure in the mound. A significant part of the archaeological deposit were unburned animal bones of turtle, deer, and bison, along with Middle Caddo period, Sanders phase, fine and utility ware ceramic sherds; Sanders is one of 26 known Caddo sites in East Texas with bison bones and/or tools. In this article, I discuss the results of the radiocarbon dating of two samples of animal bone—deer and bison—from the West Mound at the Sanders site.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:01:34 PST
- Artifacts from 41SA38 in the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory
Collections
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula
Abstract: Site 41SA38 (ET-692) was recorded in February 1940 by Gus Arnold of the University of Texas as part of the WPA-sponsored archaeological survey of East Texas. The site was identified on a natural alluvial rise in a freshly plowed floodplain on the west side of Ayish Bayou, about 1 km southwest of the city of San Augustine, Texas.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:01:26 PST
- Archaeological Investigations at the Mike Myers Site (41CE481) on Bowles
Creek in Cherokee County, Texas
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula et al.
Abstract: The Mike Myers site is a multiple component prehistoric site in the Bowles Creek valley in the Neches River basin in East Texas. The site is on an upland landform (400 ft. amsl), now a pasture with low surface visibility, between Bowles Creek to the east ca. 100 m and a spring-fed branch to the west. The confluence of Bowles Creek with Jackson Branch lies ca. 600 m to the south. Soils on the site are classified as Nacogdoches fine sandy loam. Based on the archaeological investigations conducted at the site to date, the known site area covers a ca. 150 x 60 m area (north-south and east-west) or approximately 2 acres, but the site may well extend to the south onto a lower upland ridge slope (390 ft. amsl) some distance; hopefully shovel tests can be excavated in this area in the near future to determine the full site boundaries.This article discusses the archaeological findings obtained to date from 2016 archaeological investigations at the Mike Myers site, much of it consisting of shovel tests across the site area, focusing particularly on the archaeological remains recovered in the work that date from Woodland and Caddo periods. Most notably, the shovel test work at the site recovered two sherds of non-tempered early Woodland period Tchefuncte pottery. As far as we are aware, this is only the second site in East Texas where Tchefuncte pottery has been found; the other site is the well-known Resch site (41HS16) in the Sabine River basin in Harrison County, Texas. Tchefuncte culture pottery has been recovered from the Louisiana Gulf Coast, in the Ouachita and Mississippi river basins in Mississippi, Louisiana, and southeast Arkansas, and in the Sabine Lake area of coastal Texas and Louisiana, more than 250 km east and southeast of the Mike Myers site.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:01:16 PST
- A Caddo Ceramic Vessel Sherd Collection from a Site in the Upper Neches
River Basin, Anderson County, Texas
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula
Abstract: Frank H. Watt (1889-1981) was a well-known and well-respected avocational archaeologist that lived in the Waco, Texas, area and studied the archaeology of the central Brazos River valley. He made forays into other parts of the state, however, including the Caddo archaeological area of East Texas. At an unknown date, probably in the 1950s or 1960s, Watt investigated an ancestral Caddo site on the Dennis Farm six miles northwest of the community of Neches, in the upper Neches River basin (probably in the Walnut Creek valley), in Anderson County. He collected 42 sherds from Caddo ceramic vessels from the site, and these collections are in the holdings of the Mayborn Museum Complex at Baylor University.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:01:07 PST
- Archaeological Investigations at the Bowles Creek Site (41CE475), Cherokee
County, Texas, in Early 2017
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula et al.
Abstract: The Bowles Creek is a substantial Historic Caddo period Allen phase settlement on a natural rise in the Bowles Creek floodplain in the Neches River basin in East Texas. There have been several rounds of work completed at the site since it was first recorded by Stingley, including shovel testing, the excavation of 1 x 1 m units, and the remote sensing of a 2400 square meter area. In this article, we discuss the archaeological findings from work done at the site in January and February 2017.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:00:58 PST
- Documentation of Ancestral Caddo Ceramic Vessels from Sites in Red River
County, Texas
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula
Abstract: The vessel collections at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory at The University of Texas (TARL) have ancestral Caddo vessels from a number of sites along the Red River in the Mound Prairie area. Vessels are documented in this article from four such sites, including Wright Plantation (41RR7), Howard Hampton Farm (41RR10), Sam Kaufman (41RR16), and the Abe Cox Place (with no trinomial), in the vicinity of the Rowland Clark site (41RR77). I also discuss a small ceramic sherd assemblage at TARL from the Wright Plantation site.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:00:49 PST
- Selected Caddo Ceramic Artifacts from the E. H. Buchanan Plantation
(41RR5), Bowie County, Texas
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula
Abstract: The E. H. Buchanan site is an ancestral Caddo settlement investigated by B. B. Gardner of The University of Texas in July 1930. The site lies between Pond Creek and Salt Well Slough, streams that drain into the nearby Red River, and they are not far upstream from the large Caddo mound and village center at the Sam Kaufman site (41RR16) on Mound Prairie.As described in Gardner’s notes on file at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory (TARL) at The University of Texas at Austin, the site lay adjacent to a salt lick on “Buchanan’s upper place,” on a natural alluvial mound. The archaeological deposit was ca. 20-25 cm thick, with much charcoal and ash. Furthermore, Gardner noted that “there is a spot comprising approximately 1/2 acre on which are literally bushels of potsherds, apparently from very large vessels. Unlike most of such places, it is on heavy, stiff soil.” The description provided by Gardner strongly suggests that the E. H. Buchanan Plantation is another salt-making site near Salt Well Slough, much like the Salt Well Slough site (41RR204), 41RR248, 41RR256, and 41RR257.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:00:41 PST
- Documentation of Ancestral Caddo Ceramic Vessels from the Knight’s Bluff
(41CS14) and Sherwin (41CS26) Sites, Cass County, Texas
Authors: Timothy K. Perttula
Abstract: A number of years ago, Perttula documented a variety of funerary objects through a Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) grant awarded to the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma. These were from ancestral Caddo sites on U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Fort Worth District lands in East Texas, including funerary objects from the Knight’s Bluff and Sherwin sites at Lake Wright Patman in the Sulphur River basin. These NAGPRA materials are held at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory at The University of Texas at Austin (TARL).At that time, only a few ceramic vessel funerary objects were made available for NAGPRA documentation purposes, including only three ceramic vessels from Burial 4 at the Knight’s Bluff site, and six vessels from Burials 4 and 6 at the Sherwin site. The remainder of the ceramic vessel funerary objects from these two sites (n=16 vessels from Knight’s Bluff and n=13 vessels from the Sherwin site), plus one vessel from general Lake Wright Patman contexts, either from Knight’s Bluff or the Sherwin site, have recently been documented, and they are discussed in the remainder of this article.
PubDate: Mon, 04 Feb 2019 09:00:32 PST
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