The Ancestral Caddo Ceramic Assemblage from the Will Odham Site (41CE42) in the Angelina River Basin, Cherokee County, Texas

Repository Citation Perttula, Timothy K. (2017) "The Ancestral Caddo Ceramic Assemblage from the Will Odham Site (41CE42) in the Angelina River Basin, Cherokee County, Texas," Index of Texas Archaeology: Open Access Gray Literature from the Lone Star State: Vol. 2017 , Article 20. https://doi.org/10.21112/ita.2017.1.20 ISSN: 2475-9333 Available at: https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/ita/vol2017/iss1/20

Archaeological deposits were estimated to cover a 5 acre area, but were concentrated in a ca. 60 m diameter area. These deposits had animal bone, mussel shells, ceramic vessel sherds, ground stone tools, and human skeletal materials. Burials had been reported to have been plowed up previously by the burials were ceramic pipes.

Ceramic Vessel Sherd Assemblage
The large assemblage of ceramic vessel sherds from the Will Odham site is comprised principally of sherds in all three wares from grog-tempered vessels (Table 1). Approximately 89 percent of the sherds are from vessels tempered with grog inclusions, and the remaining 11 percent of the sherds are from bone-tempered vessels. The plain to decorated sherd ratio in the ceramic assemblage is 0.94. More than 91 percent of the decorated sherds are from utility wares, and 57.5 percent of the decorated sherds have either brushed, brushed-incised, brushed-incised-punctated (Figure 2a-2b), or brushed-punctated decorative elements incised sherds with incised lines overlying the brushing marks may be from Spradley Brushed-Incised vessels, an East Texas Caddo ceramic type thought to have been made and used in post-A.D. 1680 times. The brushed to plain sherd ratio in the Will Odham site ceramic assemblage is 0.61, and the brushed to decorated sherds) or red-slipped (0.2 percent) decorative elements ( The incised and incised-punctated sherds are all likely to have primarily come from Maydelle Incised vessels with several different kinds of decorative elements on vessel rims. Together, sherds with these decorative elements comprise 15.5 percent of all the decorated sherds from the site. Six body sherds are of either circular, linear tool, or tool punctations (see Figure 2c). One set of Maydelle Incised vessels featured geometric elements, including cross-hatched, diagonal, diagonal opposed, and vertical-diagonal Additional utility ware sherds in the Will Odham site ceramic assemblage include three rim or body sherds from Killough Pinched vessels (0.3 percent), one appliqued-punctated sherd (0.1 percent), and many sherds from punctated vessels (17.9 percent of the decorated sherds) (see Table 2). Most of the punctated sherds have rows (on the rim and/or the vessel body) of tool punctations (69 percent), and the or white pigment rubbed in the engraved lines. There are also no sherds from Poynor Engraved, var. Freeman vessels (see Perttula 2011: Figure 6-64h-i), thought to be the latest (i.e., ca. A. D. 1560-1680) variety of Poynor Engraved, at least in the upper Neches River basin. There are a few sherds from Hume with hatched and/or cross-hatched lines (Figures 4l and 5d, g).  Figure 6-64c) has sets of curvilinear engraved lines forming large circular elements (see Figure 3d).

Stamped-Incised Sherd
A single grog-tempered body sherd with stamped-incised decorative elements may be from a Woodland period stamped vessel, possibly of Marksville or Troyville origin. Similar kinds of ceramics from Lower Mississippi Valley groups have been found in low densities in East Texas Woodland period sites (see Ellis

Elbow Pipe Sherd
The one grog-tempered elbow pipe sherd in the Will Odham site collections is part of the plain stem.

Summary and Conclusions
The Will Odham site (41CE42) is an ancestral Caddo settlement in the Mud Creek drainage system, part of the Angelina River basin in East Texas. The site was recorded by Gus Arnold in March 1940 during the WPA archaeological survey of East Texas, and he obtained a substantial assemblage of ceramic vessel sherds and one plain elbow pipe sherd from habitation contexts.
The analysis of the ceramic vessel sherd assemblage from the site indicates that the vessels made and used there by Caddo peoples were primarily grog-tempered, and that the vessels (including bowls, assemblage are primarily from brushed vessels (i.e., Bullard Brushed)-57.5 percent of the decorated sherds Ceramic attribute data, including the proportion of brushed sherds among all the decorated sherds, plain/decorated sherd ratios, brushed to plain sherd ratios, and brushed to other wet paste sherds ratio, from the Will Odham site suggest that the overall character of the assemblage is stylistically and socially related to both Neche cluster (Table 3) and upper Neches cluster (Table 4) sites in East Texas. These attributes, along with the kinds of Poynor Engraved varieties at the Will Odham site, suggest in particular that the occupation at the site is related to ancestral Caddo sites that predate ca. A.D. 1560 in both Neche the nearby J. B. Maxwell site (41CE43) (see Table 3).  The Will Odham site (41CE42) warrants relocation and restudy to examine its archaeological deposits and assess the potential to recover preserved material remains there, including charred plant remains and faunal remains as well as features with dateable organic remains, along with habitation features. The intensive archaeological survey of the Big Turnpike Creek valley in the Angelina River basin is also warranted because based on the ceramic data from both the Will Odham and J. B. Maxwell (41CE43) sites it is clear that the Big Turnpike Creek area was an important locus of ancestral Caddo settlement in East Texas from at least ca. A.D. 1480 to the early 18 th century.
Thanks to Lauren Bussiere at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory at The University of in the article.