Spiroan Traders, the Sanders Site, and the Plains Interaction Sphere: A Reply to Bruseth, Wilson, and Perttula

Abstract

Bruseth, Wilson, and Perttula (1995) reject my hypothesis that the Sanders site was a Spiroan entrepot, asserting that it is contradicted by “much of the archaeological record of northeastern Texas and southeastern Oklahoma” and reasserting the traditional view that Sanders is the type site for a regional “focus,” or phase, of Caddo culture. I contend that the 50-year-old Sanders focus is an ill founded, unsupportable hypothesis that Alex D. Krieger developed after James B. Griffin rejected his original, essentially correct, interpretation of the graves at Sanders as evidence of a Mississippian intrusion in the Red River Valley. The archaeological, biogeographical, and bioanthropological evidence supports my hypothesis that Sanders was an outpost maintained by long-distance Spiroan traders procuring Osage orange bows for exchange with peoples on the southern Plains.