THE USE OF SHELL-TEMPERED POTTERY IN THE CADDO AREA OF THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES

Abstract

Freshwater mussel shell was used as a temper in the manufacture of ceramic vessels by potters in the Caddo area of the southeastern United States after ca. A.D. 1300. This was at least one or two centuries after it became the dominant temper used by aboriginal groups in much of the Eastern Woodlands but generally contemporaneous with shelltempered usage in parts of the Southern Plains. The introduction of shell temper was variable across the Caddo area, and in certain regions its use was negligible in ceramic vessel assemblages until the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries but then was rapidly adopted as the dominant temper employed in vessel manufacture, particularly for utility wares. In the traditional territory of the historic Hasinai Caddo in East Texas, shell temper did not appear in vessels until the early eighteenth century, and then only in minor amounts on presumed trade vessels.     

GEOPHYSICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS AT THE CLEMENT SITE,A CADDO MOUND COMPLEX IN SOUTHEASTERN OKLAHOMA

Abstract

Since the 1960s, few professional archaeological excavations have been conducted at Caddo sites in southeastern Oklahoma. This article summarizes the initial phase of a research program designed to increase our knowledge of this area. Geophysical and archaeological investigations at the Clement site (34Mc8) were conducted during the summer of 2008 by the University of Oklahoma. These revealed deep middens, intact mound stratigraphy, and architecture, and suggest that Clement had multiple Caddo occupations spanning approximately 300 years.     

GEOPHYSICAL INVESTIGATIONS OF LATE FOURCHE MALINE AND EARLY CADDO SETTLEMENT PATTERNING AT THE CRENSHAW SITE (3MI6)

Abstract

The Terán-Soule model provides a testable means to establish if the prehistoric settlement pattern of the Caddo in the Great Bend region of the Red River consists of vacant mound centers with associated dispersed farmsteads. To evaluate the model, a geophysical survey of the Crenshaw site (3MI6) mound center was conducted in off-mound areas to determine if structures were present there. The 3.2-ha survey identified over 100 geometric anomalies, of which more than 50 are possibly structures associated with either Late Fourche Maline or Early Caddo occupations. Several possible structures were found in linear rows, including an oval series of possible structures 90 × 85 m in diameter. Additional finds include large circular anomalies between 25 and 48 m in diameter, sometimes around possible structures, suggesting the presence of compound fences, as shown in the Terán map.     

ZOOMORPHIC EFFIGY PENDANTS: AN EXAMINATION OF STYLE,MEDIUM, AND DISTRIBUTION IN THE CADDO AREA

Abstract

Caddo zoomorphic effigy pendants were crafted from a wide variety of raw material, such as freshwater mussel shell, Busycon perversum (whelk) marine shell, animal bone, and various types of soft stone. They have been documented at contemporaneous Late Caddo (A.D. 1400–1700) sites along the Red River in northeast Texas, southwest Arkansas, and northwest Louisiana; the Black Bayou, Big Cypress Bayou, and upper Sabine River basins in northeast Texas; the Ouachita River in south-central Arkansas; and the Arkansas River in central Arkansas and eastern Oklahoma. This paper describes the development of a comprehensive corpus that investigates stylistic groups, differential raw material or medium utilized, and the spatial distribution of zoomorphic effigy pendants throughout the Caddo area. Results reveal north-south heterogeneity, suggesting the presence of broader traditional cultural narratives associated with a complex idea that is manifest regionally in distinct stylistic forms and linked to Caddo beliefs concerning Beneath World themes. Additionally, this stylistic and spatial analysis offers an additional dataset to further explore social, political, and economic linkages among and between contemporary Caddo groups around A.D. 1500.     

COMPARATIVE GEOGRAPHY OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES AND THE USSR: AN INITIAL INVESTIGATION

Several aspects of the distribution of institutions of higher education and their graduates are compared for the Soviet Union and the United States. The concentration of institutions and students is found to be greater in the USSR. Differences in regional enrollment rates relative to the location of institutions and students may be partly explained by differences in the curriculum structure of American and Soviet institutions of higher education and the greater degree of local control over higher education in the United States. A direct relationship exists in both countries between the percentage of graduates in a region and percentage urban and per capita income. Regional inequality in the percentage of graduates in urban versus rural areas is much greater in the USSR while regional inequality in the percentage of male and female graduates was only somewhat greater in the United States. Level of urbanization, migration of students and graduates, economic opportunity and economic structure are seen as important factors helping explain regional variation in the distribution of graduates.     

REGIONAL FINANCIAL SEGMENTATION IN THE UNITED STATES*

ABSTRACT. Responding to continuing discussions in this Journal regarding the importance of regional money supply and credit, a simple reduced-form regional money supply model is posited and an investigation of real regional money supplies is performed for several states around the country. Hypothesis tests are performed regarding the question of regional financial market segmentation, concluding that segmentation still exists in the United States. The empirical results also imply that interregional trade, presumably via the consequent constraint on regional banks, has at least as much effect on regional money supplies as Federal Reserve policies. These results lend further support for the assertion that regionally available money matters at the local level, and that regional analysis should continue to include regional money and credit as explanatory variables. The implications for policy makers are that: 1) national monetary policy cannot cure regional ills if the problems are manifested in regional industry mixes; and 2) some proposed banking reforms now being debated in Congress, i.e, nationwide branch banking and, particularly, industrial ownership of banks, are suspect. A healthy caution is warranted without more tests of these reforms.