Documentation of Ceramic Vessels from an Early Caddo Period Feature at the Boxed Spring Site (41UR30) Site, Upshur County, Texas

Abstract

The Boxed Spring site (41UR30) is an ancestral Caddo mound center of apparent Early Caddo age (ca. A.D. 900-1200) on the Sabine River, situated on an upland landform a short distance upstream from the Sabine River’s confluence with Big Sandy Creek (Figure 1). The site is located in the modern East Texas Pineywoods, and is estimated to cover approximately 48 acres of a large and prominent upland ridge projection. There are four mounds (A-D) at the site arranged around an open area or central plaza, and there were several habitation areas to the north and south of the sets of mounds. Mounds C and D are low structural mounds (i.e., mounds built over dismantled and destroyed house structures) with prepared clay floors at the southeastern and southwestern ends of the open area or plaza. Mound C was 10.7 x 13.4 m in size. Mound D had a 45 cm thick zone of sand as mound fill over a prepared clay floor to a structure. Mound A was a burial mound about 12 x 8 x 2 m in length, width, and height at the northwestern plaza edge, and Mound B was a flat-topped mound of unknown function at the northeastern end of the plaza.