The Prairie Caddo Model and the J.B. White Site

Abstract

This article summarizes an hypothesis—called the Prairie Caddo model—presented in a research module published in 2006 to help explain some obvious connections in material culture between Caddo sites in east Texas and sites in central Texas. Harry J. Shafer prepared this module, entitled People of the Prairie: A Possible Connection to the Davis Site Caddo, as an outgrowth in part of excavations that Prewitt and Associates, Inc., performed at the J. B. White site in 2002 for the Texas Department of Transportation. Following the summary of the hypothesis is a synopsis of the results of the excavations at J. B. White and an assessment of the utility of that model for interpreting those results. The excavation data are not consistent with the idea that the people who lived on the Blackland Prairie at the east edge of central Texas between A.D. 1000 and 1300 were Caddo groups who served as a supporting population for the ceremonial center at the George C. Davis site, as the Prairie Caddo model would suggest. Rather, they appear to have been local hunter-gatherers who interacted regularly with the east Texas Caddo. This interaction included providing the Caddo with arrow points and knives, which apparently were highly prized by elites who lived, died, and were buried at the Davis site.