Caddo
By about A.D. 800, descendants of the Troyville-Coles Creek people living in northwestern Louisiana had developed close ties with people in southeastern Oklahoma, northeastern Texas and southern Arkansas. From this region emerged the Caddo Culture. These Indians developed a fine, new style of pottery, and used special ornaments and objects made from imported materials. They also performed elaborate burials of upper class people.
There was little change in the daily life of the ordinary Indians. Most people spent their lives in small villages and hamlets near streams or lakes. Many trends established in earlier generations persisted. New garden crops such as beans were introduced and were added to the corn, squash, gourds and native plants already grown. It seems that people from these small settlements were governed by high status individuals living at the ceremonial centers. Common people were probably required to help build mounds, to supply food, or to make tools or special objects for their rulers. They gathered at the centers when they were needed or when special ceremonies or festivals were celebrated.
Gahagan Site
At the Gahagan Site, in Red River Parish, early Caddo Indians built mounds and a village around a large open plaza. One mound had three deep shaft burials, each with three to six bodies and 200 to 400 burial offerings. Some of the unusual burial objects from this site are two clay human effigy pipes, two copper cutouts of human hands, two copper long-nosed mask ear ornaments, two frog effigy pipes, and numerous triangular stone blades called “Gahagan knives.”
Early Caddo people continued the Troyville-Coles Creek custom of constructing ceremonial centers with mounds around a central plaza. They built temples or special buildings on top of the mounds and also dug graves into the mounds for burials of important people.
These mound burials, however, differed somewhat from those of earlier cultures. To bury an honored priest or chief, Caddo people dug a large deep shaft, often all the way from the top of the mound to the ground level. Then they placed the chief’s body, and other bodies (possibly of sacrificed servants or family members) in the grave side by side. Special objects were piled in the corner or along the wall of the pit.
Burial offerings included well-made tools, ceremonial objects and jewelry designated only for high status people. Typical objects were fine pottery, carefully flaked stone knives, arrow points, bows, turtle shell rattles, polished stone axes, rare minerals, stone or clay smoking pipes, animal teeth pendants, bone hairpins, ear ornaments of bone, shell, or copper, and beads of copper, shell, and stone. Unusual objects were pipes in the form of humans and frogs, sheets of copper cut in the shape of hands, and ear ornaments resembling small copper masks. The face of each “mask” was an oval about three inches long, but the nose was seven inches long. Interestingly, at the same time, identical masks were also used by Indians as far away as Missouri, Wisconsin and Florida.
Caddo potters made special new shapes such as bottles, and bowls with sharply angled rims. They fired the pieces in a new way so they would be black or dark mahogany in color, then polished the dark surfaces to make them glossy. Some common ornamental designs were curved lines cut into the surface and sometimes highlighted with red or green-colored pigment rubbed into the engraved lines. Not surprisingly, much of the utilitarian pottery remained quite similar in appearance to the late Troyville-Coles Creek pottery. Caddo Indians probably still used it for daily chores, while they saved more ornate wares for special occasions.
The ordinary Caddo Culture people lived in villages away from the mound center. Their lives were centered around hunting, fishing, collecting, and gardening activities. When a commoner died, he or she was buried in a simple grave without objects. Although this way of life seems totally separate from the elaborate life of the elite, the two worlds overlapped at ceremonial occasions, when everyone gathered at the mound centers.
Caddo: a-c, Clay Vessels; d-e, Clay Pipes; f, Engraved Shell Cup; g, Shell Pendant; h, Stone Points (⅓ actual size)
Between A.D. 1100 and A.D. 1400, Caddo ceremonial life seems to have been less important. All burials were simple, with only one person in a grave. Fewer imported stones and minerals were used to make high status objects, and more ordinary pottery was made.
After A.D. 1400, there was a return to Caddo ceremonialism. Many early Caddo customs were revived, but new practices were also added. Mound construction resumed, with temples, lodges, or chiefs’ houses being built on top. These structures characteristically were built of wattle and daub and had thatched roofs. They were used for a time, then they were burned, probably when the leader or an important person died. Workers covered the ruins with sand or clay, and eventually replaced the old building with a new one. Sometimes graves were dug through the floor of standing buildings or through the rubble of burned ones. As many as seven people have been found buried together in these graves, along with food offerings and large numbers of objects.
As in earlier times, important people had special customs and belongings that ordinary people did not have. One custom was that of binding an infant’s head to a cradleboard so that as the person grew to maturity the head was noticeably flattened and therefore distinguished the high class person from people of the lower class. Upper class people used ornate clay pipes, conch shell cups, ceremonial objects, fine pottery, and jewelry. Their jewelry included anklets, necklaces, bone hairpins, and bone pottery and shell discs that were worn through the ears. Some pendants were fashioned from mammal teeth or shells, and occasionally a large sea shell pendant had a lizard or salamander engraved on it.
Caddo leaders of this late period probably used the most delicate and decorated pottery. Pots ranged in size from miniatures to large wide-mouthed storage vessels. Many shapes were made, but special vessels were formed to resemble birds and turtles, or to act as rattles. Popular designs were circles, scrolls, and crosses engraved into the vessel after firing. Engraved designs were often highlighted with red, white or green pigments.
Daily life of ordinary people was much different than that of the elite. As far as we know, the former continued to live as they had during the earlier part of the period. They lived in circular houses in small villages located near their gardens and buried their dead in simple graves with few goods.
By the time the first Europeans reached Caddo villages in the mid-1500s, Caddo Indians were divided into several distinct groups. In Louisiana, these were the Adaes, Doustioni, Natchitoches, Ouachita and Yatasi. The Indians supplied the Europeans with salt, horses, and food in exchange for glass beads, kettles, guns, ammunition, knives, ceramics, bells and bracelets. Contact with the Spanish and French explorers ended the prehistoric era, and led to rapid and devastating changes in the traditional life.