Land of the Tejas: Native American Identity and Interaction in Texas, A.D. 1300 to 1700 9780292734999

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Land of the tejas

Number Seventeen Clifton and Shirley Caldwell Texas Heritage Series

Land of the tejas Native American Identity and Interaction in Texas, A.D. 1300 to 1700 By john WesLey arnn III

UnIversIty of texas Press Austin

Publication of this work was made possible in part by support from Clifton and Shirley Caldwell and a challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Copyright © 2012 by the University of Texas Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America First edition, 2012 Requests for permission to reproduce material from this work should be sent to: Permissions University of Texas Press P.O. Box 7819 Austin, TX 78713-7819 www.utexas.edu/utpress/about/bpermission.html ♾ The paper used in this book meets the minimum requirements of ansI/nIso Z39.48- 1992 (r1997) (Permanence of Paper). Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Arnn, John W. Land of the Tejas : native American identity and interaction in Texas, A.D. 1300 to 1700 / by John Wesley Arnn III. p.  cm. — (Clifton and Shirley Caldwell Texas heritage series ; number seventeen) Includes bibliographical references and index. IsBn 978-0-292-72873-8 (cloth : alk. paper) — IsBn 978-0-292-73499-9 (e-book) 1. Indians of North America—Texas—History. 2. Indians of North America—Texas— Ethnic identity. 3. Indians of North America—Texas—Antiquities. 4. Excavations (Archaeology)—Texas. 5. Social archaeology—Texas. 6. Texas—Antiquities. I. Title. e78.t4a76 2012 976.4′01—dc22 2011014840

This book is dedicated to my wife Janée.

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Co n t e n ts

foreWord ix

by Tom D. Dillehay

aCknoWLedgments xiv IntrodUCtIon 1 1. ConCePtUaLIZIng hUnter- gatherers

and dIstIngUIshIng IdentIt y In the arChaeoLogICaL reCord 17

2. framIng a modeL of PrehIstorIC IdentIt y 36 Ethnographic Analogy and Archaeological Expectations 3. IntrodUCIng the toyah Phenomenon 52 4. assessIng toyah modeLs and arChaeoLogICaL PerCePtIons of the toyah regIon 62 5. hIstorICaL Context 81 Conceptualizing Historical Frames of Reference 6. arChaeoLogICaL Context 144 7. toyah arChaeoLogy 191 Material, Geographic Distribution, and the Concept of Toyah Culture 8. PUt tIng It aLL together 201 Correlating Toyah Archaeology with Sociocultural Identities

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9. dIsCUssIon and ConCLUsIon 234

BIBLIograPhy 257 Index 295

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his book considers the archeologically defined material culture known as the Toyah Phase in Texas and demonstrates how it represents a wide social field of cultural interaction in which various individuals and distinct groups participated in different social, economic, and political networks that linked them throughout the region. John Arnn argues that indigenous regional interaction and sociocultural identity during this phase did not emerge suddenly or with the arrival of Europeans in Texas. Instead, he emphasizes the persistence of certain social practices, technologies, interactions, and cultural identities that extended from the late prehistoric period into the early historic period. Identity and interaction can be difficult to observe archaeologically. Arnn thus takes an archaeological and historical approach to study the cultural antecedents to and descendants of Toyah. His findings strengthen the basic premise that Toyah, as a prehistoric material culture construct, is a valid archaeological concept for observing a regional social field composed of numerous culturally distinct prehistoric groups. For more than sixty years archaeologists in Texas have sought to explain culture interaction and change primarily through migration and/or external contacts from the north, east, south, and west rather than emphasizing the possibility of internal developments. Texas is located in a unique place in North American archaeology. Its geographic placement is where Southwestern (e.g., Pueblo, Mogollon), Mississippian (Caddo), Great Plains, and even a few Mesoamerican traits gathered from time to time and place to place during the prehistoric past. The potential geographic connective gap between these cultures is Central Texas and its adjacent environs. Curiously, in comparison to other regions of North America, it can be said that little has been done theoretically to research Texas archeology, its gaps and cultural mixtures, and their wider anthropological meanings. In fact, with a few exceptions, the scholarly history of Texas archeology is anti-theoretical in its

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pervasive emphasis on modeling regional culture histories. Most of Texas archaeology to date can be characterized by a consistent focus on chronology, technology, and subsistence. That focus has contributed significantly to the understanding of many important issues. I do not know why the history of research in Texas has been this way, and my purpose here is not to attempt to explain it. What I do know, as someone who has practiced archeology (long ago) in the region and still has more than a passing interest in it, is that few significant theoretical contributions have come from Texas archeology. A primary objective of Arnn’s book is to address some of the conceptual gaps that exist in Texas archeology, particularly those related to late prehistory. It is important to emphasize that Arnn does not believe that his book is a comprehensive treatment of the Late Prehistoric Period. Rather, he attempts to offer a range of concepts related to social fields, interaction networks, and changing identities that are informed by current conceptual sensibilities as well as by recent archeological and historical findings. This is not to say that Arnn’s approach is necessarily the most adequate to shed new light on this era or that all of his interpretations are correct. That judgment lies with present and future generations of scholars. Perhaps equally significant is that his book illustrates as much about what we do not know and still need to investigate and examine as it does about what we have learned from his and many other contributions through decades of field investigation and analysis of the Toyah Phase and Central Texas archeology. Arnn’s main focus in this book is social interaction and identity as a theme of study. He argues that the various identities that composed Toyah were grounded in socially constructed understandings of the past, and this is true both of those identities ascribed to Toyah peoples by outsiders and those embraced by Toyah individuals or subgroups for themselves. Thus, he considers identity as how people see themselves as individuals and groups (e.g., ethnicity), how they see those within their own social group, and how “outsiders” see them. This perspective also reflects the transformative aspect as well as the continuity implicit in identity construction. Identity construction is affected by how people see their past as well as their present, cultural norms, and outside influences, including colonial powers such as the Spanish, and what actions—for example, resistance or submission—are to be taken because of those identities. A core issue central to Arnn’s construction of a Toyah identity is that it was shaped by a shared ecological and economic past, or cultural essence in specific areas, which in turn becomes synonymous with an archeological identity (defined by settlement, artifact styles, etc.). Thus, in Arnn’s view, for the Toyah (or any other group) to have created an identity to interact with other groups, they had to have built upon pre-existing cultural x

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processes and patterns that allowed and encouraged persistent group cohesion in the face of internal change and outside influence, basing this identity in socially constructed understandings of their own past. Arnn also stresses that, regardless of the creation of an identity, most indigenous groups could not limit the amount of syncretism (primarily social and technological) that seeped into their society, nor could they avoid hybridization concurrent with cultural contact with the Spanish and other groups during the early historic period. I think Arnn is correct in adducing that identity must have been one of the principal issues confronting Toyah peoples and Europeans during the initial contact period. He believes that different groups within the social field must have operated with different sets of factors, causing new identity formations prior to and during the contact period. Such changes must have elicited some of the deeper springs of the Toyah people’s nature, their self-perception, and their social values, some of which were expressed materially in artifacts and others (e.g., thoughts and emotions) in intangible ways we cannot study through archeology. However, in turning to the written records, Arnn deduces that some Toyah groups felt loyalty and certainly identity with other indigenous groups experiencing similar circumstances of outside contact, but sometimes they also were friendly to and cooperated with the Spanish. As the political circumstances changed during this period, new loyalties and identities were created, and groups found they were often confronting former comrades as enemies, which created identities perceived as both advantages and disadvantages. He observes in the written documents that conflict and intergroup ceremonies increased during this period to strengthen intergroup alliances. We know from anthropological and other studies that ceremonies often become more dominant in certain crisis situations where people’s identities are challenged—in war, or when a political order is dissolved or a social order is seriously threatened, especially where these previously had been very settled and with conspicuous intergroup boundaries. In such circumstances, people also turn inward to their kin as well as to their inherited religious ideas (cosmology) and rituals in order to know who they are, and their loyalties and identities are redefined accordingly. As Arnn points out, the extension of political and cultural contact with the Spanish and French must certainly have presented the Toyah people with just such a dramatic challenge. But who were these archeologically defined Toyah people, and what were their changing circumstances and identities? The combined archeological and historical records do not allow Arnn to examine these issues in sufficient detail, for almost by definition the so-called Toyah entered written history only to the extent that they found redefinition as parts of the larger expanding xi

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Spanish empire. As Arnn notes, what was at stake here was their local culture, identity, and survival and how these changed as a result of interacting with other indigenous groups and with the Spanish. It is easy to see how conflict and chronic instability may have affected the way Toyah identities changed during this crucial time span, inhibiting the development of a stable relationship with other warring or non-warring indigenous populations. Where the Spanish were entrenched, the local indigenous population must have been atomized, initially looking for protection from warring comrades elsewhere. Meanwhile, as Arnn stresses, regional Toyah identity, perhaps lacking an enduring focus of social, political, or economic stability, probably became centered upon varying elements of both their own cultural traditions as well as those of the Spanish. Returning to my opening point, the absence of direct social analysis in Texas archeology to a large degree reflects the dearth or sketchiness, at least until recent decades, of the type of archeological information required for this kind of study. Beyond the broad recognition of technological transitions, such as the regional shifts in tool types (mainly projectile points and arrowheads) from the Archaic to the Contact Period, archeological information generally was not collected, processed, or organized in a manner that made the direct investigation of social interaction and identity readily possible. Nevertheless, given the increasing awareness afforded historical sequence, context, and contingency in contemporary archeology throughout the world, the direct use of historical records and models to build narrative accounts of the deeper past (without more direct empirical perspectives) presents an array of analytical problems for deriving better understandings of past societal change and interaction not only in the connective gap of Central Texas but all of Texas and beyond. Such understandings, and more data on past societies, are critical not only for the construction of culture history and social interaction in anthropology and archeology but also in regarding the nature of diversity in preindustrial societies that once occupied the regions that interest us so much. From the beginnings of the study of Texas archeology, a focal theme has been the effort to understand cultural diversity and change. Previous studies have laid a rich foundation for present and future studies. Following the contributions of earlier writings, the more current works of a younger generation have placed key aspects of societal relations at the core of their analytical frameworks. Study of the Toyah Phase provides a meeting point between past and present scientific traditions. Both have a great deal to contribute to each other on the level of understanding the past. John Arnn is well placed to facilitate this meeting: having done archeology in both Texas and Latin xii

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America, he has benefited from a varied career focused on different types of ancient societies. This book offers readers not just a theoretical account of what we know and do not know about the Toyah Phase, but also practical measures for understanding the past and preparing for future research. Tom D. Dillehay Distinguished Professor of Anthropology Vanderbilt University

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he basic premise of this book is that human identity and interaction are fluid and transformational, essentially rooted in cumulative experience, possessing unique historicity. In that light, I discussed some portion of this book with almost everyone I encountered over many years, and I am certain that everyone I met contributed in some way. By way of illustrating this point, I had almost finished writing this book when I remembered that, more than forty years ago, my mother read a children’s book to me entitled Land of the Tejas by Siddie Joe Johnson. Johnson’s book revolved around the concept that the indigenous word “tejas” meant friend or ally, and that the identity of Texas was deeply rooted in alliance and interaction through time. My moments of self-awareness are rare and generally illustrate some stunning ignorance or oversight on my part—in this case, that I was woefully under-equipped to recall and acknowledge every intellectual, emotional, and material contribution that was so generously extended to me. In a similar vein, I consider my identity to be a composite of the things I have done, the places I have been, and, most importantly, the people with whom I interact. In the same spirit, I hope readers will accept this book with my deepest appreciation and acknowledgments to everyone I know for all that I am and everything I hope to be. Thank you each and every one for your contributions to me and this book and, of course, thank you, Texas.

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his book presents a synthesis of prehistoric as well as historic information concerning the native peoples of Texas between approximately A.D. 1300 and A.D. 1700. In more than fifteen years of conducting archaeological investigations in Texas, I have found that people seldom fail to express an interest in Texas history and prehistory. Discounting the willfully ignorant, most people seem genuinely interested in the lives of others. Archaeology, the study of past people, is a branch of anthropology, the study of people, and both share the same fundamental goal: to describe and explain similarity and diversity among humans. So anthropology as well as archaeology can be viewed as an extension of people’s common curiosity in each other, although the degree of curiosity varies considerably. Some of us are drawn to difference, embracing and celebrating the exotic. Others are more comfortable with the familiar, preferring to observe the strange and different with a sort of horrified fascination from afar. Whatever our preference, we are constantly engaged in recognizing similarity and distinguishing difference in people and in the world around us. Anthropology emphasizes a holistic approach to the study of people, often incorporating multiple disciplines and multiple lines of evidence (e.g., archaeology, history, ethnography, geography, biology, and linguistics) in order to provide a more precise context. At least this is the way anthropology was described to me more than twenty years ago. Today anthropology, like so many fields, is increasingly specialized. Although specialization has its benefits, an obvious advantage of a holistic approach is its potential for constructing a well-rounded synthesis by incorporating several different perspectives. This orientation is perhaps most evident here in the incorporation of historical, ethnographic, environmental, and archaeological data across the large region known today as the State of Texas. To be sure, other peoples, places, and events outside Texas (some quite distant) are relevant to our discussion in

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terms of interaction, identity, and impact, and these too are considered. But the focus of our discussion is Texas. Similarly inclusive is the treatment of prehistory and history within the same volume. With the important exception of historical archaeology, Texas archaeology and history are generally treated as separate subjects, both in terms of academic disciplines and as texts. History is typically associated with events that occurred after the advent of the written record (in this case, the arrival of Europeans in North America) with everything prior falling under the purview of prehistory/archaeology. This book integrates aspects of both: space, people, plants, and animals are viewed as points on a continuum neither beginning nor ending with the advent of written histories or archaeological reconstructions. Thus, this synthesis is fundamentally anthropological in its perspective, relying primarily on comparisons and contrasts to recognize similarity and difference among multiple lines of evidence. The aboriginal hunter-gatherers of Texas are also addressed in a similarly holistic perspective by comparing and contrasting them with other foragers and hunter-gatherer peoples documented by ethnographers in similar environments around the world. Archaeological and environmental data are used to reconstruct the material world and daily practice of prehistoric peoples in Texas. The historical documents of early Europeans provide eyewitness accounts and insight into the lives of their indigenous historic descendants. The resulting synthesis reflects a geographically and culturally diverse as well as dynamic region, but one in which different peoples were surprisingly integrated across vast distances and hundreds of years. What follows is a reconstruction of this region in the last years of purely aboriginal interaction and in the first years of aboriginal/European interaction, an attempt to meld the old with the new and the familiar with the exotic and to communicate the complexity and diversity of Texas’s vast cultural heritage to its current inhabitants. Granted, any synthesis covering hundreds of years and tens of thousands of square miles is bound to leave some things out as well as contain some gross overgeneralizations, and this one is no exception. For some, this book will, no doubt, be far too general and for others, far too technical. Ultimately, however, Texas may best be described through the diverse and fluid character of its peoples, and there is no question that Texas was a culturally diverse and fluid place—some might even say an exotic place—three hundred to seven hundred years ago. In fact, few regions in North America present a better example of both cultural diversity and a cultural crossroads than Texas. Geographically, mountains, deserts, forests, and plains converge here, as have the cultural traditions of Mesoamerica, the American Southwest and Southeast, the Great 2

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Plains, and, more recently, Europe, Africa, and Asia. Between A.D. 1300 and 1700, Texas was home to hundreds of different aboriginal groups and perhaps a dozen indigenous linguistic families. In contrast, Europeans introduced about half as many languages toward the end of this period, most of them derivative of Latin. According to early Spanish and French historical documents, many indigenous groups in what is now Central, South, and East Texas were linked together and participated in a large political, economic, and social alliance known as Tejas. It was this loose-knit association of diverse native cultures for which the Spanish and Mexican Province of Tejas (or Texias), later the Republic of Texas, and finally the State of Texas was named. This book explores the prehistoric, environmental, anthropological, and historical evidence for the development, persistence, and fate of Tejas.

geograPhIC and CULtUraL dIversIty Texas was and still is a geographically diverse region. Biology, geology, and climatic regimes grade from almost impenetrable swamps and dense pine forests in the east to belts of post oaks, greenbrier, and Blackland Prairie as one moves west. The Edwards Plateau of Central Texas rises sharply above these surrounding prairies and savannas on its eastern and southern flanks to the almost Mediterranean environment of the Central Texas Hill Country. Somewhat reminiscent of southern France, rolling oak and juniper parklands are the dominant biotic regime found in the thin soils and rugged limestone or Karst topography of the Edwards Plateau. Rainfall percolating through sparse soils and underlying limestone fills a large underground aquifer from which many clear springs, streams, and rivers originate. Cypress and sycamore trees often line these streams and rivers and stands of native pecans are present on most terraces. Moving north from the limestone hills of the Edwards Plateau, the oak savanna gives way to a broken country of mesas and rolling plains and rises again along the Caprock escarpment to the high Cibola (buffalo) plains of the Llano Estacado. Moving west from the Hill Country, the terrain ascends to the high grasslands of the Stockton Plateau and Marfa Plain and then rises once more into scattered stands of piñon and ponderosa pines in the Davis Mountains before dropping into the arid desert of the Hueco Bolson in far West Texas. To the south of the Edwards Plateau, juniper-lined arroyos of the Balcones Canyonlands eventually yield to sage and mesquite, culminating in either the dense brush country, or monte, of South Texas to the southeast or the deep desert canyons of the Lower Pecos to the southwest. 3

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In general, the streams and rivers of Texas drain from higher elevations in the north and west toward the southeast, eventually emptying into the Gulf of Mexico along more than 630 miles of coastline. Over the course of tens of thousands of years, silt and gravel transported from higher elevations have created a broad, almost level coastal plain. Many of the larger rivers that cross the Gulf Coastal Plain are characterized by large meanders and occasional oxbow lakes, or resacas, as they approach the coast. Barrier islands, formed by the interaction of outwash sediment from these rivers and gulf waters, line the coast of Texas. This string of barrier islands shelters a rich environment of lagoons and estuaries and within them numerous species of plants and animals that make their home between sea and land. Fewer than 150 years ago, Texas was also home to a number of animal species that can now be seen only in protected parks and zoos. On the plains, tremendous herds of bison (Bison bison), accompanied by pronghorn antelope (Antilocapra americana), often took days to pass prairie dog towns consisting of thousands of burrows containing mostly prairie dogs (Cynomys gunnisoni), but also supporting burrowing owls (Athene cunicularia), ferrets (Mustela nigripes), and rattlesnakes (Crotalus atrox). Grizzly bears (Ursus horribilis) roamed the Davis Mountains of far West Texas until the turn of the twentieth century. Beavers (Castor canadensis), found in the Big Bend as late as the 1930s, constructed dams creating small wetlands across much of Texas. Desert bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis), grazed alongside mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) in West Texas until the 1950s. Black bears (Euarctos americanus), mountain lions (Felis concolor), wolves (Canis lupus), white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), whooping cranes (Grus americana), turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo), Attwater’s Prairie Chicken (Tympanuchus cupido attwateri), and quail (Colinus virginianus) were all found throughout large portions of Texas. Several cats including ocelots (Felis pardalis), bobcats (Lynx rufus), and jaguarondis (Felis yagouaroundi ) prowled dense brushy thickets, and the largest cat in the Americas, the jaguar (Felis onca), was also found here. Numerous wetlands, most now drained, were inhabited by many of these species as well as alligators (Alligator mississippiensis), otters (Lutra canadensis), mink (Mustela vison), muskrats (Ondatra zibethicus), and untold numbers of waterfowl and migratory birds. Prior to urban development, intensive agriculture, and ranching, Texas possessed extensive grasslands and open parkland savannas with deep soils capable of capturing and retaining significantly more moisture than today. Consequently, springs, streams, and rivers flowed with greater volume and frequency, with many flowing year-round where today we see only dry stream beds. For example, a survey conducted in 1981 of the 281 major and histori4

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cally recorded springs in Texas found that about half were failing or had already failed (Brune 1981). Thus, a contemporary time traveler to Texas in A.D. 1500 would likely be astonished by the number of springs, perennial streams, and wetlands, as well as by the numbers and variety of flora and fauna. But it would be a mistake to characterize prehistoric and early historic Texas as a vast pristine wilderness, untouched by human hands. By the time Europeans arrived in the first half of the sixteenth century, this region had been occupied for perhaps fifteen thousand years, even as many as twenty thousand or thirty thousand years. Although most prehistoric Texans made a living by hunting and gathering, some began farming here as early as the twelfth and thirteenth centuries A.D. Some of these farmers built small towns or pueblos consisting of multi-roomed wattle and daub plastered houses and farmed the arid river valleys of far West Texas along the Rio Grande. Others raised corn along the tributaries and in the main valley of the Canadian River in the semi-arid Panhandle plains and constructed semisubterranean homes, or pithouses, from large stone slabs, wood, and wattle and daub plaster. People in north central Texas farmed along the Brazos and Red Rivers and lived in small round or rectangular structures framed with wooden poles and covered with hides, reed mats, or grass thatch. Farther east, people cut clearings in the dense pine forests, erected earthen mounds and topped them with houses and temples, and cultivated corn, melons, and squash in the deep soils of East Texas. Thus, hunter-gatherers and farmers had interacted for hundreds of years by the time of European contact. Nevertheless, for thousands of years most indigenous peoples in Texas practiced hunting and gathering or foraging. Faunal assemblages and botanical remains from archaeological sites indicate that medium and light game animals (such as deer and rabbits) and various plants (i.e., nuts, bulbs, and tubers) were common components of the terrestrial diet for many people across this region. Bison, antelope, freshwater fish, and mussels were also often present, and almost certainly a wide variety of plants that were not preserved in the archaeological record. But the importance and frequency of some plants and animals as a daily dietary component may have been more significant in some areas (such as the plains and prairies) during specific seasons than in others, and in some areas these food sources were, no doubt, absent altogether. Moreover, the significance of hunting has likely been overstated. Studies of twentieth-century foragers in similar environments indicate that wild plants frequently represented 70 percent or more of the daily diet, suggesting a substantial if not primary investment of time and labor spent foraging for plants. Historical accounts and more recent research among hunter-gatherers in 5

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North America as well as sub–Saharan Africa and Australia also indicate purposeful and significant alteration of the landscape through the use of fire. Several Spanish accounts mention indigenous groups setting brushfires in order to drive game toward hunters. Ethnographic data as well as range and wildlife management studies also indicate that fire can be an important ecological tool in maintaining healthy habitats for a number of diverse plant and animal species. Periodic burns decrease brush species (such as mesquite and juniper), temporarily increase soil fertility, and encourage the growth of grasses. Conservationists have also noticed that the combined effects of controlled burns often result in a higher water table. Ironically, after years of suppressing fire, this ancient tool is slowly becoming an integral part of modern range and wildlife management practices and is increasingly seen as a way to support and maintain valuable rangeland as well as soil and water resources. Fishing is also a form of foraging, and fisher folk plied the lagoons and estuaries of the Texas coast. Numerous groups also exploited the immense aquatic resources (fish, shellfish, water fowl, and aquatic plants) in the undammed rivers and rich wetlands of the Trinity River basin in North Texas, the broad river valleys of the Gulf Coastal Plain, the swamps of East Texas, and the Rio Grande Delta in South Texas. Today bits and pieces of freshwater mussel shells mark prehistoric campsites along inland streams and rivers where many species of mollusks are now extinct or their numbers have been greatly reduced. Large piles, or middens, of oyster and clam shells, some larger than a football field and taller than a house, once marked the locations of campsites along the Texas coast (Aten 1983). Thus, despite the introduction of farming (by 1100 A.D. at the latest), foraging in a variety of forms remained the predominant means of subsistence. Moreover, the long duration of the foraging tradition throughout most of Texas implies a remarkably successful adaptation to this region. The exact date for the arrival of the first hunter-gatherers in Texas remains uncertain, and until recently data pointed to the peopling of North America between eleven thousand and thirteen thousand years ago. However, based on scientific evidence from Monte Verde, Chile, many archaeologists now acknowledge a date in excess of approximately fourteen thousand years ago (Dillehay 1997, 2000; Dillehay et al. 2008). Deeper archaeological deposits at this same site may yield even earlier dates than fourteen thousand years ago. Notwithstanding, if the peopling of the Americas advanced from eastern Siberia into western North America and then through the Americas from north to south, as many archaeologists hypothesize, it is likely that hunter-gatherers inhabited North America, including Texas, for some time prior to their expansion into South America. 6

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IdentIty: ComParIng and ContrastIng—LUmPIng and sPLIttIng Given fourteen thousand-plus years of successful foraging, the people of the Americas had ample time and opportunity to evolve and diversify in terms of customs, language, and social, economic, and political organization. Some foragers became increasingly specialized by limiting their focus to just a few key resources, such as fish or bison, while others concentrated on exploiting a very broad resource base. Some hunter-gatherers eventually turned to the domestication of plants and animals (entirely independent of Old World processes) and became farmers and herders. Evidence for all of these forms of subsistence can be found in the archaeological and historical record, and we may infer still more forms of subsistence within this range. Unfortunately, several aspects peculiar to foraging tend to mask the diversity among hunter-gatherer groups within a region. For example, hunters and gatherers do not typically generate large amounts of nonbiodegradable possessions or construct large cities or monumental architecture. High mobility, minimal material possessions, and direct reliance on resources in the immediate environment produce comparatively ephemeral material remains, often making it difficult to identify campsites. These attributes also suggest that even culturally different forager groups would have a correspondingly high degree of similarity in technology and materials (there are only so many ways to catch and skin a rabbit). Combined with poor preservation of perishable artifacts that might have distinguished one group from another (such as clothing, fetishes, tattoos), it would be easy to mistake similar artifacts, technology, and subsistence and settlement patterns as indicative of cultural homogeneity throughout the region. In contrast to hunter-gatherers, farmers tend to be more sedentary and occupy more densely populated settlements. As a general observation, dense, sedentary populations produce comparatively large amounts of durable cultural debris (ceramics, architecture, roads) that is confined to a fixed geographic area and related to specific practices, materials, and technologies in that area. These contrasting images frequently result in an implicit perception of foragers as less socially and technologically sophisticated as well as more culturally homogenous than sedentary agriculturalists. In fact, the application of generalized categories or stereotypes, also sometimes referred to as “lumping,” represents a fundamental step in assigning meaning to objects, people, and the world around them. People can hardly be expected to grasp immediately the totality of something at first encounter. So these initial and often cursory assignations represent the first steps in the 7

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process of identity construction and are intended to do little more than get us in the “ballpark.” Any deeper meaning or understanding requires far more context. When we first encounter others, we make cursory examinations and may entirely misconstrue who people are and what they represent. Eyewitness accounts from crime scenes suggest that even the most basic morphological characteristics (i.e., height, weight, sex, and age) can be confused. Closer inspection and previous experience may lead us to a more precise, if inaccurate, description. But it is important to always keep in mind that individuals are composed of multiple identities. None of us are simple creatures. All of us are unique individuals. In this sense, the statement, “You don’t know me,” rings true. The people we know as mother, father, brother, and sister are friends, enemies, lovers, bus drivers, librarians, or doctors to others. Each of us is a combination of almost infinitely entwined social interactions in which we tell people who we are and they, in turn, tell us who we are. This is certainly true when discussing groups of people and, perhaps more importantly, when discussing how we group people. The terms “forager” and “hunter-gatherer” are used interchangeably in this book and are intended to reflect primarily small mobile groups of people who obtain the majority of their foods from wild sources. But this generalization does not include early European accounts of the fisher folk of the Pacific Northwest who sustained themselves entirely off wild foods and lived in plank houses in large sedentary villages with populations numbering in the hundreds. Nor do these terms recognize those who primarily gathered rather than hunted and are referred to as “gatherer-hunters.” Food producers too are often lumped together as “agriculturalists” or “farmers,” despite considerable and significant variation. For example, growing corn in the American Southwest, cultivating taro in Polynesia, ranching in Texas, and herding reindeer in Finland are hardly comparable. But this does not stop people from assigning extremely broad labels to specific activities and the people who conduct them. Similarly, the term “Spanish” in this book, as well as many other terms, does not precisely describe what it implies. As anthropologist Mariah Wade (2003: xxi) points out, “the Spain that colonized the Americas was composed of many . . . Castilians, Catalans, Basques, and Galicians as well as Italians, Portuguese, French, and Greeks.” The issue of identity, who precisely they or we are, is complex. First, because humans group people and things through comparative analogy from general to more specific terms and, second, because identity on both an individual and cultural scale is, by definition, a fluid and ever-changing but, nevertheless, contextually based process. 8

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As one anthropologist put it, “To be German in 1995, for example, involves emphasizing or de-emphasizing different things than being German before re-unification; and both would be very different to nominally equivalent identifications in 1938, or 1916, or 1871” ( Jenkins 1996: 93). Individuals, families, communities, cities, states, and whole civilizations rise and fall while retaining and discarding situationally relevant traits and practices from their histories, creating new ones, adopting others in interaction, and often passing some on to the emerging identities that follow. Although frequently perceived in rather static terms as a sort of label or moniker, cultural identity may be more precisely characterized by dynamic multi- dimensional social interactions at multiple scales through time and space. Today the people of Texas present a vast and diverse population that is constantly changing. Shortly after the beginning of the twenty-first century, Texas surpassed New York as the second most populous state in the United States, second only to California. The results of this growth are numerous, significant, and pervasive changes that can be felt in virtually every facet of political, economic, and social institutions as well as in the environment. Yet, despite dynamic change and significant diversity, the contemporary inhabitants of Texas retain a broader sociocultural identity—Texans. This book presents a model of late prehistoric and early historic Texas that was also extremely dynamic and diverse and suggests that as early as A.D. 1300 aboriginal peoples living in this region may have also recognized a broader sociocultural identity. Although the prehistoric inhabitants of Texas almost certainly did not think of the region as we think of Texas today, Spanish colonial documents defined this region as the Province of Tejas based on the existence of a large indigenous alliance, referred to by Native American member groups as “Tejas” or “Texia.” Tejas was composed of dozens of different groups who spoke different languages and lived in what is today East, Central, South, and (perhaps) West Texas. Many Texans today recognize the term “tejas” as a Caddoan word for friend. But as early as 1691, a Spanish friar named Fray Francisco Casañas de Jesús María, living among the Asinai Caddo, recorded that the word “tejas” referred to an “ancient” alliance that integrated dozens of diverse groups across the region through political, economic, and social ties. Archaeological investigations conducted in Texas over the past sixty-five years also recognize some type of broadscale integration in the archaeological record of the very late prehistoric period that immediately preceded European contact. This culture, referred to by archaeologists as “Toyah,” is distinguished by a remarkably similar and widespread group of artifacts, gen9

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erally associated with hunting and gathering, that seems to have appeared approximately seven hundred years ago and spread across almost half the state. Though centered on the Edwards Plateau of Central Texas, Toyah archaeology extends into adjacent areas in virtually every direction (Black 1986, Collins 1995, Hester 1995, Johnson 1994, Kalter et al. 2005, Mallouf 1987, Shafer 2006b). Although most archaeologists agree that Toyah represents some type of widespread prehistoric phenomenon, explanations for the emergence, spread, and disappearance of Toyah—as well as its connection to the historic period, if any—remain unclear. Archaeologists do acknowledge widespread similarity, as well as some diversity, in Toyah sites across the region. But they also point to the scarcity of historic artifacts in Toyah sites, suggesting to some ( Johnson 1994) little or no connection to historic Native American groups. Although almost half of the four hundred-year Toyah Interval falls well within the Historic Period (between approximately A.D. 1535 and A.D. 1700), archaeologists, with few exceptions (Arnn 2007, Kelley 1947), are reluctant to draw direct connections between Toyah and historic Native American groups that occupied the same region. This book presents a decidedly different perspective from most archaeological models of both prehistory and, in particular, late prehistory and the early historic period in Texas. Perhaps the greatest contrast in the approach presented here is the emphasis on variation and change over a broad area, as well as the concept of culture as a continuum. Rather than focusing on defining a specific material culture in space and time, material culture is viewed as a product of various identities that are themselves derivative of a larger (spatially and temporally) cultural tradition, possessing both antecedent and descendant traits. This perspective allows for the numerous conditions and causes that surround identity construction and avoids isolating sociocultural groups in time and space. Although it is certain that some elements are more pervasive and/or specific to the construction of sociocultural identity (climate certainly plays a significant role in shaping the identity of peoples living near the Arctic Circle), the causes and conditions for identity may also be attributable to a number of interrelated reasons. These may include the diverse historical traditions of the individuals and groups from which identity coalesced, its geographical location, and broader historical trends at a larger regional scale beyond its borders (Bush 2004: 127). It is also likely that many of these factors are constantly changing through time and that some cultures may not necessarily reflect a specifically designed coherent system, but may be better understood, 10

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“as a culture of assimilation where new people and new customs were readily absorbed” (Bush 2004: 131). The latter example can explain the disappearance of one culture and the simultaneous rise of another as one or more groups are assimilated or integrated into neighboring ones. This type of culture change is common throughout history and there is no reason to suspect that it did not occur in prehistory. Identities are fundamentally processual, “generated in transaction and interaction and are, potentially, flexible, situational, and negotiable” ( Jenkins 1996: 102). Similarly, religion, politics, ethnicity, race, and language are multi-dimensional and inherently transformative (Friedman 1994, Jenkins 1996, Jones 1997, Sahlins 1985). Identity then is a complex mosaic process composed of various attributes maintained internally and externally that require change in order to remain referentially meaningful through time and across space. In order to understand identity, we must also look at the interactions, transformations, and fluctuating processes from which it emerged. Although most people live their lives in the present (from day to day) and at a local/community (face-to-face) scale, there is often a temporally and spatially broader field of social interaction in which individuals as well as groups participate in kinship, trade, and alliance relationships encompassing large regions and, usually, several generations. Moreover, it is the combination of these practices, the knowledge of the past as well as the anticipation of the future, occurring at various scales and in different dimensions that results in the formation of social and/or cultural identity as well as its inevitable transformation ( Jenkins 1996, Sahlins 1985, 2002). If the local community is the place where group-specific cues and categories of similarity and difference are presented and reinforced through repeated daily face-to-face social interaction (be it foraging, child care, storytelling, food preparation, craft production, etc.) and in which behavioral expectations of similarity and difference are formed (Schortman 1989: 53), then it is in the broader context of social interaction beyond the immediate community, among others, that local behavioral expectations and identities are presented, challenged, changed, and/or reinforced (Barth 1969). Perhaps nowhere is this dynamic, multi-dimensional aspect of social interaction more evident than among hunter-gatherers living in marginal or environmentally variable regions. Anthropologists (Wobst 1974, MacDonald and Hewlett 1999, McBrinn 2005) have long recognized that the forager band, as a basic human organizational unit of between twenty-five and seventyfive people, is simply too small to be endogamous (marry within the group). People require a larger social network or marriage group consisting of per11

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haps two hundred to six hundred individuals in order to acquire suitable marriage partners and remain reproductively viable. Marriage partners are not the only things exchanged in an endogamous group. Language, cosmology, technology, and culinary habits are also frequently shared among the various bands that together form a marriage group, also sometimes referred to as a linguistic group. In addition, when resources are particularly scarce in one area of the endogamous marriage/linguistic group, a band may benefit from access to a broader resource base by visiting another more abundant band territory. However, in some arid and semi-arid regions (such as the American Southwest, the Kalahari, or portions of Australia) even participating in a social organization as large as a marriage group may not be sufficient to offset or buffer the risks of a variable environment. Droughts and floods may create widespread and long-term environmental catastrophes that require social contacts well beyond local boundaries. Therefore, bands, as well as marriage groups, may participate in a much broader social organization, the “risk-sharing economic network,” perhaps encompassing different language groups, geographic zones, and even subsistence patterns (McBrinn 2005: 3). Thus, these three fundamental types of hunter-gatherer identities (bands, marriage groups, and long-distance networks) also reflect different temporal and spatial contexts of hunter-gatherer interaction. Theoretical perspectives concerning human interaction differ on a number of issues, but “all agree that societies rarely, if ever, are isolated from each other and developments in one cannot, therefore, be understood without reference to events occurring within contemporary interaction partners.” Thus, “our most basic task at present is to develop a theoretical framework that will facilitate the study of intersocietal contact” (Schortman 1989: 52). Applying this argument specifically to archaeology suggests that, to varying degrees, similarities and differences in material culture depend on the “strategies and intentions of interacting groups and on how they use, manipulate and negotiate material symbols as part of these strategies” (Hodder 1986: 185). These three fundamental identities—bands, marriage groups, and longdistance networks—provide a framework for contextualizing ethnographic, environmental, historical, and archaeological data into a region-wide model for hunter-gatherer cultural identity at three interrelated scales: 1) the community/band composed of several families numbering perhaps fifty individuals who interact with each other on a daily basis, 2) the endogamous social aggregate (simplified here to marriage group and/or marriage/linguistic group) composed of several bands related by kinship and language that may 12

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interact a few times a year, and 3) long-distance social networks composed of numerous marriage/linguistic groups that may have little or no direct contact during the year or that may have indirect contact through representatives, traders, or messengers.

three fUndamentaL sCaLes of IdentIty Archaeologically, the smallest scale of hunter-gatherer identity addressed here is that of the band, or community, represented by individual sites. Given an array of site types with different functions occupied by various members of a band/community at different times of the year, sites occupied most frequently and for the longest periods by the broadest demographic sample of band members are considered the key archaeological component for observing community identity. This site type, generally referred to as a “residential base camp” by ethnographers and archaeologists (Binford 1980, Halstead and O’Shea 1989, Hardesty 1977, Hitchcock and Bartram 1998, Kelly 1995, Lourandos 1997, Price and Brown 1985, Yellen 1977), also corresponds to numerous indigenous settlements reported and described in Spanish colonial documents from the Province of Tejas as rancherías (Campbell 1988, Foster 1995, Hickerson 1994, Kenmotsu 2001, Wade 2003). Thus, the residential base, explicitly defined within ethnographic, archaeological, environmental, and historical contexts, provides the fundamental archaeological component and correlate for observing identity and social interaction in the prehistoric and historic record. The archaeological correlates of community/band identity are represented here by individual residential base sites, i.e., rancherías. Groups related by language and/or kinship are correlated archaeologically with numerous sites in a geographically circumscribed area possessing very similar material culture (e.g., stylistic decoration, artifact classes, assemblages, materials, and features) that can be distinguished as a group from other sites in adjacent areas. These areas may also correspond to the historically documented location and range of Native American linguistic groups and/or naciones, referred to by some as tribes, documented by Spanish and French chroniclers. The archaeological correlates of long-distance networks are observable in the broad distribution of the same or similar artifact types, stylistic decoration, assemblages, and/or related features throughout a region, as well as the distribution of various exotic (non-local) artifacts and materials in different areas of this same region. Here too the material evidence for long-distance 13

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networks may correspond with documentary evidence describing specific goods that were traded among several groups and across vast distances within a large region. These three fundamental aspects of hunter-gatherer identity also correspond to overlapping temporal and spatial dimensions of social interaction that often reflect the scope of individual and group intentions or objectives. For example, community/band identity may be actualized at a local and immediate scale corresponding approximately to the daily practice and annual cycle of individuals and families observed in the residential base camp. Moreover, the intentions and strategies of people living within such communities would tend to be reflected in individual sites, such as residential bases, by the ephemeral and pragmatic character of material correlates related primarily to seasonal subsistence and settlement, such as tools, features, faunal assemblages, and site locations with respect to specific local resources. At a broader geographic scale, several small bands inhabiting adjacent territories may exchange marriage partners in order to maintain a viable reproductive population. Through proximity and intense social interaction over time, these communities may also come to share many of the same practices, evidenced by similar material culture in residential sites, and even the same language. At this scale of analysis, the archaeological correlates of the combined intentions and strategies of several communities may be evident in the degree of similarity, longevity, and distribution of stylistic decoration in specific artifact types, such as ceramics or arrow points, among several sites within a particular geographic area. Thus, this type of archaeological correlate may signal social reproduction of identity in an endogamous marriage/linguistic group rather than the more temporally immediate and spatially local goals of the material culture resulting from daily subsistence within a specific community. Although evidence for long-distance social networks, such as exotic artifacts, technologies, or materials, may suggest rather ambitious intentions by specific groups or individuals, archaeological correlates may reflect extremely limited interaction and/or differential interaction by the parties involved in terms of the quantity, quality, and distribution of artifacts. For example, a long-distance interaction network between coastal populations and inland groups may be evident by only a handful of marine shell fragments in just a few inland sites. Alternatively, coastal sites may reflect the entire lithic assemblage of the inland group with whom they interacted. Both examples present interaction between two groups, but one indicates the transfer of material and the other the transmission of ideas and technology. In terms of social interaction, this example suggests two groups or identities employed different 14

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strategies and objectives resulting in different outcomes for each party. Despite the infrequency and distance of such interactions, this book presents evidence indicating long-distance networks between some groups may have endured for several hundred years spanning virtually the entire region. Thus, this book presents a fundamental framework for investigating social interaction by reconstructing identities throughout the regional landscape. Whereas the community/band is represented by individual sites (primarily the residential base), the endogamous marriage/linguistic group is represented by clusters of communities with similar material culture that also corresponds to historical, ethnographic, and environmental data concerning community size, location, subsistence and settlement patterns, and language. Long-distance social networks are defined archaeologically by the presence of exotic goods and the broad distribution of Classic Toyah artifacts in individual sites throughout the region, as well as historical documentation of trade and social interaction. What is argued here is that the broadest distribution of Toyah material culture represents the approximate extent of a large regional social field in which numerous individuals donned multiple identities at various scales according to specific situations and conditions. It is also reasonable to infer that during this four hundred-year period social interaction, as well as identities, did not remain constant. Although the primary focus here is on communities, marriage groups, and long- distance social networks, these basic identities likely functioned as vehicles or platforms through which other ephemeral, but perhaps more situationally relevant identities could be donned or discarded (Appadurai 1996, Bernardini 2005, Friedman 1994, Jones 1997, Sahlins 1985). Thus, identity represents a significant source or potential for influencing situations and achieving specific goals. Identity then may be best viewed as an agent of action that individuals use in various situations to achieve specific goals and objectives. The reconstruction presented here is a combination of almost one hundred years of archaeological investigation in Texas and surrounding areas, the earliest European eyewitness accounts of indigenous people in Texas, environmental data covering significant portions of Texas, and ethnographic interviews of twentieth-century hunter-gatherer groups living in similar environmental settings (i.e., sub–Saharan Africa and portions of Australia). Together, these various types of information provide a general model of hunter-gatherers and a context for conceptualizing many of the people who once lived in the land of the Tejas. This model provides the framework for describing, reconstructing, and explaining similarity and diversity among indigenous peoples who lived in Texas between A.D. 1300 and 1700. This reconstruction of Texas differs from most in at least three basic ways. 15

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First, it presents prehistory and history as different points along the same continuum by combining prehistory and history in the same volume. Second, it focuses on defining specific sociocultural identities in the archaeological record, and third, it examines how these identities interacted across this region through time. All of these issues are generally under-represented in the archaeological literature of Texas.

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Con C e P t Ua L I Z I n g h U n t e r gathe r e r s a n d d I s t I n g U I s h I n g IdentIty In the arC h a e o Lo g I C a L r e Co r d

T

he Europeans who colonized Texas derived most of their sustenance by producing their own food rather than living entirely off wild foods. In the strictest sense, most contemporary Texans are neither foragers nor food producers. However, as the recipients of food produced by a market economy, we may consider ourselves participants, at least indirectly, in the production our food. As food producers, we also live in an age of conspicuous consumption in which people are judged to a greater or lesser extent by the amount of resources they consume, control, and/or possess. Perhaps not surprisingly, complex societies (complex in the sense that they consist of more parts) easily accept the implication that food producers are generally more sophisticated, complex, and progressive than foragers. The idea that complexity, modernity, and progress go hand in hand has existed for some time, but so too has its antithesis: simplicity, antiquity, and regression. Thomas Hobbes, referring in 1651 to the “natural state of man” prior to agriculture and formal government, described human existence as “solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.” Within the last fifty years, anthropologists have gained a somewhat different perspective on foraging societies as well as complex societies and have begun to question precisely what constitutes complexity and progress in terms of the way people live their lives. For example, studies among twentieth-century hunter-gatherers living in marginal (arid and semi-arid) environments in sub–Saharan Africa and Australia indicate that some foragers worked as few as eighteen hours a week to sustain themselves and their families. The rest of their time was spent playing with and teaching their children, visiting friends and family, and participating in extensive social, economic, and political networks. More recent studies suggest a slightly more robust workweek (twenty to twenty-five hours a week). Nonetheless, the sum of this research presents a forceful case that even foragers living in a marginal environment have a surprising amount of leisure time. Moreover, these data

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indicate that it is very likely that foragers living in richer environmental settings (i.e., not a desert) led even more leisurely lives. These studies also ignited a long smoldering debate in anthropological circles on the meaning and efficacy of terms such as “progress” and “complexity.” The apparent leisure and rich social lives of hunter-gatherers subsisting on the edges of the habitable world thrust the qualitative issues of human life (e.g., leisure time, hours devoted to labor, family time) into the center of this debate. For perhaps the first time, quality of life issues were seriously questioned quantitatively. For example, it is difficult, if not impossible, for most “modern” humans toiling forty and fifty hours a week simply to feed and clothe themselves, put a roof over their heads, and pay for child care not to wonder if civilization has overlooked something. True, we live longer, get places faster, and enjoy air conditioning, but in the four hundred years since Hobbes’s dismal description of “uncivilized” humanity, what has Western civilization accomplished? How has daily society changed, and are these changes necessarily for the better? Might a narrow and decidedly negative perspective suggest that we have merely succeeded in making life nasty, brutish, and long? These questions, coming at the end of the twentieth century, also coincided with a growing awareness of population pressure, the rapid depletion of natural resources necessary for life, the consequences of small- and largescale wars, and the combined lethality of many human actions in general. Although unpleasant, these issues emphasize a point that is generally unknown or forgotten by most people today: anatomically, modern humans existed for approximately two hundred thousand years as hunters and gatherers. Foraging as a full-time subsistence practice did not cease until the end of the twentieth century. By comparison, the advent of farming some ten thousand years ago and writing some four thousand years later and all the civilizations that rose and fell since may be considered little more than a relatively short and, as yet, unfinished experiment. Consider too that, within this comparatively short span, we have managed to threaten the very existence of life on this planet. Thus, from a strictly biological perspective of species survival, civilization may ultimately prove to be an unsuccessful adaptive strategy. Foraging, on the other hand, worked well for a very long time indeed, and it is still far from clear to many anthropologists why humans ever seriously considered alternatives. For better or worse, we have embraced the alternative and by the end of the twentieth century, people who earned their living exclusively by hunting and gathering had all but vanished. Furthermore, we can never go home again. All seven billion of us cannot simply return to the wild places from which we sprang, many of which no longer exist or lie buried 18

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beneath large metropolitan centers. Despite some negative aspects of civilization, who among us would give up full bellies, warmth in the winter, cool in the summer, while remaining dry all year? Yet we, the Taylors, Wangs, Garcias, Schoenholzes, Duboises, Abids, Levis, and all the rest did not spring up overnight. Modern, or rather contemporary, humanity is the result of thousands of generations and countless adaptations to an almost immeasurable variety of situations and conditions across the planet. Who we are, where we come from, and where we are all going are not simple questions and cannot be answered in a brief synopsis, but this issue of identity does provide some context for considering our place in time and space.

hUnter- gatherers and yoU Perceptions of past people are seldom clear in contemporary minds. Robert Kelly (1995: xii), in discussing the way films and books present foragers, states that “hunter-gatherers are schizophrenically portrayed as what we think we used to be: the original hippies or the ultimate road warriors.” These images, as well as other inconsistencies, are often reinforced and sensationalized by popular media depicting club-wielding men, women clad in fur bikinis, humans and dinosaurs coexisting, and ice age people harnessing mammoths for draft animals. In fact, the truth may be just as interesting. But what we do not know about our ancestors would fill volumes. Scientific evidence points to the emergence of anatomically modern humans approximately two hundred thousand years ago. But for many years, evidence of higher brain functions in humans (i.e., music, art, and a belief in the afterlife, or at least some sort of cosmology) was found almost exclusively in the Upper Paleolithic cave paintings, carvings, and figurines of Europe. However, the masterpieces of the Upper Paleolithic were dated to only about forty thousand years ago. This suggests that the development of the human brain lagged considerably behind the development of the human body, perhaps by as much as one hundred and sixty thousand years. Thus, the Upper Paleolithic was considered by some to mark the flowering of cognitive flexibility in the human mind, “learned behavior in contrast to instinctual behavior” and “cultural transmission in contrast to genetic transmission” (Kent 1996: 7). However, archaeological discoveries are made daily and significant finds related to the cognitive abilities of anatomically modern humans have been made elsewhere in the last fifteen years. For example, in the 1990s, sophis19

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ticated bone tools, dating to more than ninety thousand years and similar to those from the Upper Paleolithic in Europe, were discovered in caves in Zaire (Yellen et al. 1995). More recently, layers containing abstract representations engraved on pieces of red ochre (a mineral pigment that is ground and used for decoration), as well as shell beads, were recovered from Blombos Cave on the coast of South Africa and dated to between seventy thousand and seventy-seven thousand years old (Henshilwood et al. 2002). In 2007, a cave component at Pinnacle Point, also on the South African coast, yielded complex stone tools, shellfish, and red ochre dating to approximately 164,000 years ago (Marean et al. 2007, Brown et al 2009). This latter discovery places the systematic exploitation of marine resources, use of red ochre—ostensibly, for art, personal adornment, or pigmentation of some type—as well as the manufacture and use of heat-treated small blades or bladelets much closer to the emergence of biologically modern humans. These, as well as other recent discoveries, suggest that mentally and anatomically modern people, very similar if not identical to us, were present more than one hundred and fifty thousand years before the first civilizations emerged. These discoveries support the idea that at least some of the complexity apparent in contemporary humans was also present in the past. Although, as an eminent anthropologist once said, “we can never step into the same culture twice,” there do seem to be constants, or at least consistent threads, of human experience that transcend time. Historical texts (from the Epic of Gilgamesh to Sun Tzu’s The Art of War to the Old Testament) echo the mundane events as well as miraculous triumphs and tragedies of men and women’s lives through the ages. In the words of Dickens: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, . . . the period was so far like the present period.” A similar Dickensian perspective is presented here in that people, events, and conditions may be contextually different, but thematically similar. This perspective implies that most people through time possessed approximately the same cognitive potential. In short, there is little need to distinguish between primitive or prehistoric persons and modern or contemporary people. Nevertheless, given the relatively great antiquity of our species—the fossil record indicates approximately two hundred thousand years (Smith et al. 2007, McDougall et al. 2005), compared to the dawn of our first civilizations—it’s fair to consider the concept of prehistoric, as opposed to modern, humans for a moment. For example, my ancestors were not participants in the first great civilizations of west and east Asia between eight thousand and ten thousand years ago. In fact, when those societies flourished, my own distant relatives, like many people in other parts of the world, were likely huddled around a fire in 20

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a cave or dirt-floored hut in northern Europe. Until about two thousand years ago, this author’s ancestors on the British Isles were rushing into battle almost completely nude, much to the consternation of invading Roman legions. So the idea that people today are different at some fundamental cognitive level from people two thousand or even ten thousand years ago is difficult to accept. It is perhaps best to simply say that cognitively we are the product of an extraordinarily long prehistory (approximately one hundred and eighty thousand years) about which we know next to nothing. For all our achievements in art, literature, and technology, our selfawareness is at best minimal, amounting to perhaps 1⁄18th of our total existence. Put another way, imagine being eighteen years old and only remembering the last year of your life. In this sense, discussions focusing on the postmodern condition of humans are almost a moot point. For even as we change the environment at an increasingly faster pace, we can hardly consider ourselves post-prehistoric. For example, agriculture is scarcely ten thousand years old and yet, prior to World War II, half of the U.S. population was considered rural, and, yet, within the span of a few years American society had transformed itself into a predominantly urban population. Many of these recent changes affect the most fundamental elements of our lives as strangers raise our offspring while we labor indoors under artificial light in windowless structures, breathing conditioned air. The ramifications of these most recent changes are as yet unknown. But it seems unlikely that creatures who spent two hundred thousand or more years foraging across the landscape will adapt in fewer than fifty years without some growing pains. There is also a tendency to perceive and present our hunter-gatherer ancestors as wildly opposed and/or polarized caricatures of ourselves, ranging from Herculean brawn to Einsteinian brain. Unfortunately, our visions of ice age hunters spearing woolly mammoths on windswept prairies or harpooning whales from small leather-skin kayaks amidst calving glaciers often obscures equally impressive, if less spectacular, achievements. In the peopling of the Americas, for example, the logistics of entering and colonizing not one but two unknown continents completely devoid of other humans and filled with new types of plants and animals boggles the mind. Imagine humans so sophisticated that they were capable of adapting to any situation and overcoming any obstacle. Today, such feats are performed only by our most elite military units. Yet, thousands of years before agriculture was developed, the first cities built, and the first armies formed, families had successfully conquered almost every habitable niche on Earth. Most of us forget that the peopling of the world was not conducted by trained 21

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shock troops, but instead by families. The triumphs and tragedies of these migrations were not the achievements of “simple” or “primitive” humans, but rather the culmination of tens of thousands of years of application, experience, and assimilation by the modern human mind. Part of the problem in conceptualizing hunter-gatherers is that we think of them as dated and/or obsolete versions of humanity in general and ourselves in particular. But for contemporary humans, particularly Americans, the term “dated” can be applied to anything that happened last week or last year. Our perception of modernity is frequently associated with the latest technological developments, which are often obsolete almost before they are created. Thus, the constituent elements of civilization (e.g., agriculture, cities, hierarchical political organization, writing)—which took approximately ten thousand years for humans to invent, adopt, combine, and disseminate globally and which were preceded by perhaps one hundred and ninety thousand years of development—tend to be subsumed under a veil of comparatively recent gadgets, such as cell phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), MP- 3 players, and digital cameras. Recent technological advances are not equivalent or easily compared to the achievements of our ancestors because they differ not only in the degree of change, but also primarily in the kind of change that has occurred. There is little question that humans have invented remarkable things over the last ten thousand years, particularly in the last one hundred to two hundred years. Although the advent of the bow and its application as a weapon, drill, and fire-starter may pale in comparison to vaccines, antibiotics, and laser surgery, modernity too has many hidden costs. Despite great technological strides, we have managed to contaminate our air, our water, and our food—often as a direct result of these same technological advances. At present, the survival of the entire planet is the subject of considerable debate. Thus, one could say that this veil of technology has obscured some fundamental principles of human survival, such as clean air, food, and water and a healthy lifestyle. Nor are these perceptions lost on most individuals, as one fellow from the South Side of Chicago put it, “We’ve been majoring in the minors.” Moreover, ten thousand years of civilization, which is to say ten thousand years in western Asia and far fewer in most other places of the world, are not easily compared to the two hundred thousand years of prehistory modern humans spent as foragers. In fact, either ten thousand or two hundred thousand years is a very long time for most people to wrap their brains around. In some introductory anthropology courses, generally on the second or third day of class, the professor asks the students to thumb through their text (usually a weighty volume) until they come to the last letter of the last word of the last 22

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sentence in their book. “Imagine,” says the professor, “that this book represents a timeline of all human existence.” Then pointing to the last letter, the professor says, “This represents all of recorded history.” The rest, as we say, is prehistory. So perhaps it is unfair to expect contemporary folk to view their foraging ancestors as family or be familiar with what their family was up to before agriculture and writing came to their corner of the world. There is also a tendency to dismiss our foraging relatives as simpler versions of ourselves when some of our finest moments and greatest achievements as a species may have occurred on their watch (i.e., the peopling of every continent except Antarctica). It is also difficult to imagine that these people survived, indeed flourished, without many of the qualities we commonly admire and value in individuals today, such as intelligence, strength, courage, agility, loyalty, endurance, and compassion. Nevertheless, for all the geniuses and heroes there were likely plenty of idiots and cowards. As short as recorded history may be, it does document a remarkably broad but consistent set of human traits through time. Perhaps the most realistic perspective is to infer that past people had the same capacities as contemporary people and thus the same range. We may assume, then, a wide variety of individuals and peoples, with some representing the very finest of beings and others the very worst, with all the rest somewhere in between. This implies an almost unlimited potential for diversity among individuals and groups of the past. Along these same lines, many anthropologists have commented on the “fluid, shifting, opportunistic, and flexible social and political organization and general lifestyle of modern foragers.” This seems particularly applicable to individuals: “some anthropologists claim that within-group diversity is the most distinctive characteristic hunter-gatherer societies have in common” (Kent 1996: 7). The perspective presented here is that prehistoric foragers and modern humans all possess the same potential for this opportunistic, flexible, and varied lifestyle. Thus, as a species, Homo sapiens possess the same cognitive capacities and capabilities, and, despite some superficial differences, we are all very much the same people and have been for thousands of years. If this is the case, then the differences between us (the diversity in individuals and cultures everywhere) result from cultural flexibility, which is learned, rather than cognitive capability, which is genetically transmitted. “The consequence of dependence on learned behavior and cultural transmission is a freedom from the constraints of rigid behavior forced by instinctual thinking and acting” (Kent 1996: 7). Cognitive flexibility, considered by some to be one, if not the, great defining characteristic of anatomically 23

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modern humans, also “enables cultural flexibility and generally encourages diversity” (Kent 1996: 8–9). It was precisely this type of flexibility and the resulting cultural diversity that enabled foragers to explore and colonize most of the planet and for some to eventually become pastoralists (livestock raisers) and farmers. Despite this diversity, most anthropological studies of hunter-gatherers tend to focus on similarities (Kent 1996: 1). The most obvious similarity anthropologists recognize among foragers and, perhaps, the greatest difference between them and food producers is their reliance on wild foods. But the emphasis placed on subsistence has obscured much of the cultural flexibility as well as diversity (cosmology, language, settlement patterns, and political, economic, and social organization) that anthropologists have documented only recently among foraging societies in the late twentieth century (Kelly 1995, Kent 1996). Historical accounts from the ancient Greeks, Romans, and Chinese, as well as the Aztecs and Incas, also reflect an emphasis on subsistence strategies and a general tendency to perceive all foraging peoples as culturally homogenous. For example, the Mexicanos, or Nahuas (commonly known as the Aztecs), identified numerous small hunter-gatherer groups inhabiting the vast hinterlands of northern Mexico simply as Chichimecas (Flint and Flint 2005: 420). As many populations around the world became increasingly more specialized, stratified, and sedentary, the context in which cultural flexibility and diversity once thrived decreased significantly. After all, villages, towns, and cities were no place for small, culturally diverse, and highly mobile bands of egalitarian-minded people who relied primarily on wild resources. Foragers were also increasingly characterized in negative terms and in opposition to more complex societies and/or “civilization.” If foragers were living in what complex societies perceived as the wilderness or nature and complex societies were attempting to control nature and tame the wilderness, then it stood to reason that those societies must also control or tame foragers. Ironically, the reluctance of foragers to embrace specialized food production and sedentism resulted in a general perception that they were somehow backward, resistant to change, and less culturally flexible than their more “civilized” cousins. Thus, the very traits (flexibility and diversity) that had enabled foraging peoples to expand into every available niche and, ultimately, to evolve into more complex societies became liabilities as the world became increasingly more sedentary, specialized, and structured. Nevertheless, by the end of the twentieth century, anthropologists also began to realize that perhaps nowhere was cultural flexibility more evident and cultural diversity more vigorously pursued than among and within small 24

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egalitarian forager bands (Blackburn 1996, Guenther 1996, Kelly 1995, Kent 1996, Yellen 1977). A combination of related factors—including high mobility, egalitarianism, and a general tolerance for individuality—contributes to and reinforces flexibility and diversity. For example, many highly mobile forager societies are characterized as “acephalous,” literally without a head (Kelly 1995, Kent 1996). In such societies, egalitarianism prevails and all individuals are essentially autonomous with no single opinion outweighing another. Although a particularly skilled individual may temporarily assume a quasi-leadership role as an “adviser,” once the situation requiring their talent concludes so too does their role as an adviser (Kent 1996: 10). Decreased mobility and sedentism result in an entirely different set of conditions for highly mobile foragers and require specific behavioral adaptations. In the past, when conflicts occurred between forager groups or individuals within a group, mobility was a viable “arbitrator”—disgruntled neighbors simply moved away. People also frequently returned with few or no repercussions from the previous conflict. Sedentism provides no such built-in relief valve, and anthropologists during the late twentieth century observed that as sedentism among once-mobile forager groups increased, so too did conflict (Kent 1996: 10). Neighbors were now essentially permanent fixtures and when problems arose they were forced to confront each other. These confrontations often escalated into violence. The newest Basarwa (Bushmen) settlements in the Kalahari saw a sharp increase in violence, even murder (once almost unheard of ), as they began to develop social skills for conflict resolution in a sedentary setting and in the absence of formal leadership. However, as Susan Kent points out, by definition broad-spectrum foragers necessarily possess a high degree of cultural flexibility in order to adapt to changing environmental conditions, and they are, in fact, adapting to sedentism. “It is fascinating to observe that among Basarwa who have been sedentary for centuries, in contrast to Kutse where they have been sedentary for only one or two decades, formal leadership is emerging” (Kent 1996: 10). For those of us living in cities and serving on committees and juries, ten to twenty years may seem like a long time for these groups to elevate traditionally temporary advisers to new permanent leadership positions. But it is important to remember that people have lived in stratified, hierarchical, and nonegalitarian societies for at least a thousand years. Although recorded history reflects a wide range of cultural variation— from rigid conformity to few, if any, limits on individual freedom—some of the earliest examples of writing (that great hallmark of civilization) are clay seals documenting the type and quantity of goods, as well as codified laws indicating significant and enforced social, economic, and political stratifica25

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tion and hierarchy. Today, more than six thousand years after the advent of writing, few of us consider that our society is characterized by rigid stratification and institutionalized inequality. Nevertheless, social, political, and economic organization is generally stratified along hierarchical lines based on gender, age, status, and ethnicity. Kent suggests that the more divisions there are, the more rules are necessary in order to regulate with whom and in what way individuals may interact. The more rules there are, the greater the need for more formal education “which encourages greater conformity” (Kent 1996: 15). These observations are not a critique of complex societies or civilization. Indeed, the anthropological evidence cited above suggests that in a broad sense some stratification and authority is necessary if only to resolve conflicts associated with sedentism. Instead, they are presented here to define what cultural flexibility means and to emphasize the range of variation that is present or, in the case of foragers, was present in humans. It is one thing to simply state to a group of twenty-first-century Americans that their ancestors, along with a handful of twentieth-century foragers, were mobile, culturally flexible, and egalitarian. But it is an entirely different matter to ask contemporary Americans to frankly and seriously consider themselves in comparison to our foraging ancestors or foragers of the twentieth century. Despite a perception of ourselves as rugged individualists and freethinkers with a well-developed sense of freedom that prizes individual autonomy, we live in a highly structured, hierarchical, conformative society in which almost every facet of daily life is controlled. Many Americans, for example, receive a formal education through at least high school, read and write the same language, pay taxes, possess specialized jobs working for other people, and have others produce their food and hold onto their wealth. Moreover, a closer appraisal of twenty-first-century American life reveals that laws enforce, regulate, and/or control virtually all these things. For example, laws govern how you copy material from and dispose of this book! Perhaps nowhere is the extent of structure more evident than in the degree to which we organize our time and space. Although we are sedentary, most of us leave our homes at a specific time to go off to labor in the “workplace” for a specific period of time and come home to live, eat, bathe, and sleep in specific rooms at specific times. Taking a hard look at ourselves is not simply an exercise in postmodern rhetoric; it provides us with a conceptual starting point, a baseline for comparison, if you will. Self-reflection in our busy society may be something of a luxury, and it is perhaps understandable if we do not stop and consider the structure and character of our society. A closer examination of our own lives 26

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in comparison to our forager ancestors suggests we are very different, yet, we are all descendants of prehistoric foragers. In the bustle and business of daily life, this is rarely considered. For example, during a dinner discussion, an intelligent and articulate person posed the following question to an anthropologist: “I wonder what happened to the hunter-gatherers that finally settled down?” The anthropologist replied, “Well . . . we’re all sitting here having dinner.” It may also be difficult for many to identify with either the foragers or the complex societies presented in this book. The characterization of foragers may simply be too alien and the description of structured life in complex society too unpalatably structured. Cultural flexibility, however, permits us all to live in the same world but to perceive it from a number of different perspectives. This explains, in part, why on the one hand we (contemporary “civilized” Americans) can dismiss with an air of superiority the complex cosmologies, veneration of ancestors, and extensive oral histories (some extending back many generations) of hunter-gatherers as little more than ritualized fairy tales. Meanwhile, most Americans cannot recall their own greatgrandparents’ names as they hurtle through time and space in planes, trains, and automobiles, text messaging and checking their e-mail. Nevertheless, we all come from a long and distinguished line of foraging ancestors. Furthermore, this ancestry is far older than any pastoral or agricultural ones and, therefore, any serious look at hunter-gatherers should begin with some healthy self-reflection on these issues. It is likely that many, if not most, of our emotional and intellectual processes are shaped, or at least subtly influenced, by this foraging heritage. It is too simplistic to merely assume that we are “hard-wired” to be hunter-gatherers, for we are certainly capable of innovation and change. But it would also be a mistake to forget this oldest, perhaps most pervasive behavioral framework of our human genealogy.

defInIng forager IdentItIes In the arChaeoLogICaL reCord “Social Identity Theory” per se (Tajfel and Turner 1979) was originally developed by sociologists to understand the psychological basis of intergroup discrimination, focusing on the situational aspects in which members of one group discriminate in favor of their own group and against other groups (Tajfel et al. 1971). The goal of this research was to determine the minimum number of individuals in a group in order for in-group discrimination to occur—the answer was three. Anthropologists, on the other hand, have gen27

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erally paired the term “identity” with various descriptors (e.g., social identity, cultural identity, ethnic identity, national identity) to define different types of social groups at various scales, ranging from hunter-gatherer bands composed of a few nuclear families to modern nation states (Barth 1969, Friedman 1994, Jones 1997, McBrinn 2005, McElreath et al. 2003, Olivier and Coudart 1995, Rowlands 1994, Tajfel and Turner 1979, Turner 1982). The basic process of identity construction, whether described by sociologists, anthropologists, or psychologists, appears to be the same. According to Tajfel and Turner (1979), identity construction occurs when historical events and the environmental setting provide a basis for comparison (context) between different individuals or groups and one or more individuals groups perceive another as relevant for comparison. For example, among small hunter-gatherer groups (generally referred to as “bands,” composed of perhaps five to seven families, representing twenty-five to thirty-five individuals who live, work, and play together on a daily basis in the same territorial range) recognizing group members is almost instantaneous. Many of these people are related and/or grew up together. In addition, they may inhabit areas with low population density where simply meeting someone they do not immediately recognize constitutes an “other” identity. Social stratification based on status, sex, age, divisions of labor, and wealth also tends to be minimal among individuals who possess few material belongings and are highly mobile. There is also little need to demonstrate one’s identity in such small groups. Nevertheless, when in contact with others (i.e., strangers or neighboring bands), even these same types of groups will distinguish themselves, either explicitly through dress or personal adornment or implicitly by speaking their own particular language or dialect. The extent to which this is due to forethought as opposed to habit or history varies with the situation and the objectives of individuals and groups. Simply put, identity is formed when an individual or group acquires enough information to recognize similarity or mark difference in another individual or group. The extent to which individuals and groups wish to display similarity or mark difference also varies considerably. It is easy to imagine a situation in which one group wants another group to perceive them as similar. There are also situations in which an individual may emphasize differences in another group in order to promote greater cohesion within their own group. Many anthropologists (Appadurai 1996; Barth 1969; Bourdieu 1977, 1990; Giddens 1979; Goodman and Leatherman 1998; Jones 1997; Preucel and Hodder 1996b; Marcus and Fischer 1986; Sahlins 1985; Shennan 1993; Yellen 28

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1977) acknowledge that people are bound together and/or set apart by dynamic, situational, and historically referent relationships that are contingent on “the cultural standards that actors themselves use to evaluate and judge the actions of ethnic co-members, implying that they see themselves as ‘playing the same game’” (Barth 1998: 6). The defining element of social groups, their identity, is socially constructed through discourse and daily practice at multiple social scales, internal and external to the group in question, that are, in turn, conditioned by historically, environmentally, temporally, and coincidentally specific events, subject to change through time. This conceptualization of identity acknowledges the unique, complex, dynamic, and interrelated character and history of all groups and communities and accurately reflects the everyday lived experience of contemporary peoples. Since the 1980s, a growing number of archaeologists (Baumann 2004; Bernardini 2005; Dietler and Herbich 1998; Dobres and Hoffman 1994; Hodder 1986; Jones 1997; Lemonnier 1989; Lightfoot et al. 1998; McBrinn 2005; Pauketat 2003; Shanks and Tilley 1987a, 1987b; Shennan 1993; Stark 1998; Willey and Sabloff 1993) have begun to adopt a similar perspective regarding the nature of sociocultural identity and interaction in prehistory. Archaeologists will never know all the precise conditions that shaped prehistoric social interaction and, by extension, identity—what one anthropologist referred to as the “imponderabilia of daily life” (Malinowski 1922). But the fact that individuals collectively (as a group/community) discriminate, select some objects and ways of doing things (practices) and discard others on a daily basis, within the context of specific situations and conditions (environment and historicity), provides a basis from which archaeologists may begin to reconstruct prehistoric social identities. All of this is to say that prehistoric archaeologists are not so very different from other anthropologists in what they do—which is to assign meaning and construct identities in a reflexive process based on limited data. What is different is that most anthropologists can directly observe similarities and/ or differences in social discourse and practices that distinguish one group from another and, thus, define sociocultural identity. In fact, “ethnicity” and “ethnic identity” are generally used in anthropological circles to denote groups in which identity is self-ascribed (Barth 1969, Baumann 2004, Jones 1997, MacEachern 1998). In short, people belong to specific ethnic groups because they or someone else say they do, and, thus, it seems unlikely that prehistoric archaeologists will ever record or document firsthand demonstrative self-ascription. “Ethnic identity” is most often documented by ethnographers and/or ethnohistorians through interviews or written text and, as such, remains beyond the purview of prehistoric archaeology. Instead, archaeolo29

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gists must rely primarily on their own interpretations of the material record to infer social discourse and practices and define prehistoric identities. Therefore, archaeologists are placed in the unique position of implicitly acknowledging the constructed nature of identity without necessarily being able to explicitly recognize and describe the discourse and practice that created it. If there are no hard-and-fast rules for predicting practice and social discourse within a group or among several groups, then defining identity in the prehistoric archaeological record hinges primarily on archaeological reconstructions of specific traits in specific areas during specific periods that can be compared with and contrasted against others. Historically, such reconstructions are based on correlating the limited geographic distribution of specific types (generally grouped by style and function) of artifacts, artifact assemblages, features, and architecture (collectively referred to as archaeological or material cultures or traditions) with specific groups of peoples, such as ethnic groups, tribes, or races ( Jones 1997, Lightfoot 2001, Pauketat 2003, Sassaman 2001, Stark 1998, Willey and Phillips 1958). This method of distinguishing prehistoric sociocultural identity has proven particularly effective when applied to large, sedentary, and socially stratified societies that adapted in very specific ways to relatively stable environmental conditions and produced copious amounts of material culture (North American examples often include fisher folk and agriculturalists such as the Kwakiutl of the Northwest Coast, the Calusa of Florida, the Caddo of Texas, and various Puebloan groups in the Southwest). These types of societies often produce highly visible and durable archaeological signatures of their identity on the landscape (e.g., distinct types of villages [formal spaces and architecture], cemeteries, and middens, as well as distinct artifacts, assemblages, and features [ceramic, lithic, and metallurgical technologies]). When plotted on maps, societies often present different stylistic and technological distributions of material culture reflecting various social territories, boundaries, and exchange relationships (Stark 1998). However, such reconstructions are not particularly applicable to large, environmentally variable regions inhabited by small, dispersed hunter-gatherer groups that were neither sedentary nor inclined to the industrious production of particularly durable, visible, and distinctive material culture (contemporary ethnographic examples include Botswana Bushmen and Australian Aborigines inhabiting arid and semi-arid regions of Africa and Australia [see Kelly 1995 and Lourandos 1997]). In fact, foraging subsistence in such environments dictates that people move often and keep their numbers relatively small in order to avoid depleting local resources. Applying these ethnographic data to prehistory suggests we envision ar30

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chaeological equivalents to these groups as relatively small sites dispersed across the landscape. Willey and Phillips (1958: 49) termed archaeological units of the smallest magnitude “components” and stated that “the social equivalent of the component is the ‘community,’” adding that community is defined as “the maximal group of persons who normally reside together in a face to face association” (Murdock 1949: 79 [Willey and Phillips 1958: 49]). Correspondingly, many ethnographers recognize the band, composed primarily of nuclear families and seldom numbering more than twenty-five to seventy-five individuals, as the smallest social unit among foraging populations (Kelly 1995). Thus, for the purposes of this discussion, the smallest hunter-gatherer social unit is recognized as a band composed of perhaps a half-dozen or more families that reside in a community. However, the spatial distribution of a forager community is rarely, if ever, limited to a single site. Typically, hunter-gatherer communities consisted of several different types of sites, including, for example, kill sites, processing stations, observation sites, and residential base camps (Figure 1.1). These sites reflect specific functions or practices and were occupied intermittently by various members of the community at various times of the year corresponding primarily to the relative abundance of resources in the area (Binford 1980). This would have been particularly true where the density and/or abundance of resources, such as food and water, varied dramatically over the course of an annual cycle (Hall 1998, Hester 1981, Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: 31, Taylor 1964). Archaeologically, this means there is seldom a straight one-to-one correlation between a single component at a specific archaeological site and a hunter-gatherer band or community. Therefore, in regions where relatively marginal (in terms of precipitation and/or temperature) environmental conditions prevail, archaeologists often look to the residential base camp. Although only one of several site types within the range or territory of a community, the residential base is composed primarily of nuclear families and is generally recognized by anthropologists as a fundamental and central aspect of hunter-gatherer social organization (Halstead and O’Shea 1989, Hardesty 1977, Hitchcock and Bartram 1998, Kelly 1995, Lourandos 1997, Price and Brown 1985). The residential base is often repeatedly occupied by more members of the community at the same time than any other site type and, therefore, represents the broadest demographic cross-section of the entire group. In addition, the duration of their stay, combined with repeated occupations, often results in greater material accumulations and, thus, greater archaeological visibility than other site types found in the community range (Binford 1978: 451–497, Yellen 1977: 36–136). 31

fIgUre 1.1 Hunter-gatherer community (after Binford 1980: Figure 1).

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But, as Pauketat (2003: 41) points out, it is the productive action involved in practice, rather than the isolable event of the finished product, that defines social life and cultural identity. In short, the meaning of life lies in the doing. Since 1970, some important practice theory studies (Bourdieu 1970, 1977, 1990; Giddens 1979; Lightfoot et al. 1998; Ortner 1984) have emphasized the significance of daily life in structuring and reproducing cultural meaning and social identity. As Lightfoot et al. (1998: 201) states, “[P]eople repeatedly enact and reproduce their underlying structural principles and belief systems in the performance of ordering their daily lives.” It is through the daily practice of mundane and repetitive activities that the various materials and forms of common everyday artifacts and features are selected and crafted, resulting in an “internalized understanding” of the material tradition (Stark 1998: 6). This process, passed from generation to generation within the band, defines the local material tradition of a community. Therefore, the residential base, as the “hub of subsistence activities, the locus out of which foraging parties originate and where most processing, manufacturing, and maintenance activities take place” (Binford 1980: 9), represents the most significant site type when investigating the identity of hunter-gatherer communities. The basic analytical unit in terms of site type employed here is the residential base. Due to its relatively dense and repeated occupations, the residential base presents a visible and realistic starting point. This is particularly true with respect to locating a site in which men, women, and children structured, shared, and reproduced the behavioral expectations of social identity through daily practice within a specific community. Smaller sites (e.g., lithic acquisition sites, kill sites, fishing sites) within the community range may inform archaeologists of specific activities conducted by a group through specific types of artifacts or features (e.g., primary cortex flakes, game jumps and faunal assemblages, shell middens). Nevertheless, these sites do not contain the cumulative and broad range of data evidencing the activities practiced by most people within the community. However, the residential base campsite generally represents the archaeological site type for observing daily practice (i.e., sociocultural identity). Although a minimum figure of twenty-five people representing five to seven families is often cited by anthropologists (Kelly 1995: 209–211) for community/band size, Kelly suggests that “we should regard hunter-gatherer demographic data with a healthy amount of skepticism.” Indeed, Kelly’s review of maximum and minimum sizes for bands reflects a range of diversity throughout the world. However, he does present two figures or “magic numbers,” twenty-five and five hundred persons respectively, for describing 33

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the minimum or basic parameters for hunter-gatherer group sizes (Kelly 1995: 209). The twenty-five-person figure refers to a single band/community, whereas the five hundred-person number reflects a larger social aggregate composed of several bands. For example, the twenty-five-person/five-to-seven families figure (Wobst 1974) represents the minimum group size capable of handling “short-term fluctuations in fertility, mortality, and sex ratio for any length of time” (Kelly 1995: 211). It also reflects the minimum number of people able to field enough active foragers to sustain the group as a whole, other members being too young, old, or infirm. In addition, people living in marginal or environmentally variable regions must strike a balance between group size and local resources. However, a band capable of sustaining itself economically may be too small to represent a healthy human breeding population (Kelly 1995). Thus, the five-hundred-person figure reflects a social aggregate composed of several bands/communities that together represent a viable breeding population. Nevertheless, comparisons of ethnographic data indicate considerable variation in the sizes of these types of social aggregates (Kelly 1995). For example, Birdsell (1953), working among Australian aboriginal population units, presented group estimates ranging in size from 175 to 1,000 persons. Although Kelly (1995: 209–210) points to several possible errors in Birdsell’s initial model, Birdsell concluded that aboriginal tribal size generally remained constant at around five hundred persons. Twenty years later, Wobst (1974), using a complex computer simulation (including sex ratio, fertility and mortality rates, and cultural mores influencing marriage practices) found that the minimal equilibrium size for a human breeding population fluctuated between approximately 175 and 475 persons (Kelly 1995: 210), suggesting Birdsell was not far off the mark. Most anthropologists now accept that in order to reproduce biologically, huntergatherer bands must participate in a wider scale of social interaction (social aggregate) of roughly five hundred persons (Kelly 1995: 210). Spatially, a marriage group may encompass several hundred or even thousands of square kilometers and numerous bands. Although similarities in residential sites within a marriage group may reflect a similar environmental setting, there is little doubt that intermarriage results in shared practices, technology, and language (Giddens 1979, Wobst 1974). Similarly, it is reasonable to infer that several, almost identical residential bases (representing small communities) clustered in the same area represent a larger social aggregate—related through, for example, kinship, practice, language—equivalent to a marriage group (McBrinn 2005), maximal band (Wobst 1974), and/or 34

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language group of perhaps two hundred to six hundred individuals. At this scale, given the proximity as well as the similarity in material culture, perhaps the greatest obstacle to determining sociocultural identity is distinguishing where one community ends and another begins—in short, distinguishing difference rather than similarity. At a broader regional scale, encompassing several hundred thousand square kilometers, it may be possible to distinguish dozens of distinct marriage/linguistic groups composed of hundreds of hunter-gatherer communities/bands interacting in an economic risk-sharing network (McBrinn 2005) or social field (Lesser 1961). The term “social field” is used here somewhat interchangeably with “economic risk-sharing network,” however, social field is intended to imply a broader context for the types of interactions occurring between individuals and groups. At the regional scale, many residential bases may display similar material culture (e.g., arrow points, scrapers, ceramics, hearths, middens). However, despite some similarities, the style, materials, and designs of artifacts and features may be different and/or absent altogether from one area of the region to the next, reflecting different environmental settings, as well as more or less social interaction. At this scale, differences in the archaeological record from one area to the next may be more pronounced than similarities. But archaeological data alone are rarely sufficient to support a model of prehistoric hunter-gatherer social interaction and identity. Ethnographic, environmental, and historical data often provide critical information, guidance, and supporting evidence to archaeological data. The research presented here uses these types of data to contextualize three aspects of identity and social interaction (band/community, marriage/linguistic group, regional social field) in the archaeological record. These are certainly not the only substantive issues concerning the huntergatherers in Texas, nor are they intended to address all the issues concerning sociocultural identity and interaction. However, the fundamental problems associated with recognizing multiple identities and interactions at various spatial and temporal scales are addressed. Furthermore, these issues represent some of the most persistent, fundamentally relevant, and neglected (in terms of research) aspects of hunter-gatherer studies in this region.

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ognitive flexibility provides all humans with the opportunity for cultural flexibility, diversity, and a basis for differentiation and identity. Similarly, Social Identity Theory and the corresponding anthropological perspectives outlined in previous chapters indicate that differentiation and identity are fundamental aspects of human behavior. Thus, social differentiation and interaction form among even the smallest and most dispersed groups occupying a region (i.e., mobile hunter-gatherer bands). This suggests that, when presented with a sufficiently large enough area, archaeologists should begin with the working premise that multiple groups once interacted with each other, regardless of any first impressions concerning archaeological visibility, invisibility, or distinctiveness. In short, archaeologists should assume sociocultural diversity (multiple identities) as well as interaction. Conceptualizing hunter-gatherer bands in terms of communities composed of a number of sites is also important archaeologically because it links functionally different and dispersed site types within a bounded geographic area as the territory or range of a specific community. Moreover, similarities and differences reflected in the archaeology of various sites is significant because it may approximate the fluid, permeable nature of social relations observed ethnographically among contemporary and historical peoples (Hardesty 1977, Kelly 1995, Lee 1979, Lightfoot 1983, Lourandos 1997, Sahlins 1974, Yellen 1977). Fluctuations in environmental conditions such as rainfall and temperature may vary considerably throughout the year. But the general climatic pattern year after year may remain relatively stable for many generations. Membership in and interaction with more than one group may permit bands or even smaller units of the group, such as nuclear families and/or individuals, access to the resources (economic, political, or social) beyond their immediate spatial or temporal range. This situation likely encouraged repeated contact

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among different communities and suggests that hunter-gatherer identity is constructed at multiple scales in time and space and is internal as well as external to the group. The reality of hunter-gatherer existence—and, perhaps, the human condition in general—is that it is highly situational. This can be moderated to some extent by adopting, possessing, and/or cultivating an identity that permits one to move from a bad situation to a better one. Furthermore, when identity is associated with inheritance or kinship, one need not be present in order for one’s offspring to benefit. Identity and its sociocultural currency is intimately tied to specific situations and, thus, may be more or less valuable in one place, time, or social setting than another. This is why some anthropologists (Godelier 1975, Hardesty 1977, Kelly 1995, Lee 1979, Lightfoot 1983, Sahlins 1974, Yellen 1977, Yengoyan 1968) emphasize complex social networks beyond the community level as a key feature of hunter-gatherer settlement and subsistence patterns. Fundamentally, they suggest, this type of interaction serves to mitigate some effects of a variable climate and “offset constraints set by particular social or socio-demographic environments” (Lourandos 1997: 25–27). As Lourandos (1997: 25–26) notes, some suggest that this “open” model of social interaction is often too narrowly applied to hunter-gatherers occupying variable environmental regions. They propose instead that the model can be extended to other regions that are more consistently fertile and inhabited by more sedentary peoples. Nevertheless, there is no question that broad or long-distance hunter-gatherer social networks operated throughout many regions in historic times and that they operate among food producers today (Dietler and Herbich 1998, Hitchcock and Bartram 1998, Kelly 1995, Roseberry 1998, Welsch and Terrell 1998). This situation, in which small communities are linked into a broader regional social network, is very similar to what Alexander Lesser (1961), borrowing from British social anthropologists, described as “social fields.” The term “social field,” or field of social relations, has been used interchangeably with social network to indicate a “web of social, economic, and political relations” (Welsch and Terrell 1998: 52) that exists between members of different social aggregates—groups, settlements, communities, tribes (Lesser 1961: 41). These fields or networks can be quite large and include many groups, languages, and local environments, each with their own unique social, economic, and political potential (Welsch and Terrell 1998: 53). But for Lesser, the fundamental implication was that social relations within these fields, similar to those within groups and/or communities, “are patterned, not unstructured, adventitious, or incidental” (1961: 43). To sup37

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port this statement, he cited numerous examples of patterned social relations among American Indian, Australian, Melanesian, and African “primitives,” including intermarriage, visiting and travel, feuds and rights of asylum, war and peace-making, and attendant capture and/or adoption. Lesser also suggested that social fields seem to more closely “fit the realities of sociohistorical situations” (1961: 43) and cited Firth (1951: 28): “Fields of social relations, not clear-cut societies, must be the more empirical notion of social aggregates.” Anthropologists have documented numerous cases of foraging societies around the world participating in complex and often long- distance social and exchange relationships (Hardesty 1977, Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: 23, Kelly 1995: 187, Welsch and Terrell 1998: 51). The frequent interaction of many distinct hunter-gatherer groups within a region through numerous social relationships also indicates that, despite vast distances, the level of sociocultural integration among the general population may be relatively high. Thus, the permeable and flexible character of hunter-gatherer social boundaries, combined with a relatively light complement of durable and visible material culture, may mask the material signature of distinct groups (McElreath et al. 2003, Wiessner 1983, Lourandos 1997). In short, the very things (e.g., the persistence of stylistically and functionally distinct artifacts, features, and architecture) often used to signal difference and define group membership (social identity) among and between more sedentary social groups might be passed or shared among several distinct forager groups over many generations. Furthermore, beyond the scale of communities, marriage/ linguistic groups, and long-distance social networks, such “fields” of interaction might appear or present another level or aspect of social identity encompassing whole regions. Being aware of the situational and historically contingent nature of interaction and the flexible and porous boundaries between groups in large regions can be helpful “because the movement of people and ideas between groups tend to attenuate group differences” (McElreath et al. 2003: 122). Huntergatherer mobility reflected in considerably lesser amounts of, as well as more portable, material culture may also blur the distinctions of identity between different groups across a regional landscape. Thus, social fields may obscure or mask the variation of a pluralistic cultural setting by mixing or blending the material cultures of several groups across a single region. Nonetheless, social fields may be easier for archaeologists to spot due to the uniformity of cultural material distributed across hundreds of thousands of square kilometers and, perhaps, hundreds of years. 38

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Several historic and ethnohistoric studies focusing on the interaction between empires and provincial indigenous groups also present instances when donning the identity of others provides a social, economic, or political advantage (Elton 1996, Friedman 1994, Malpass 1993, Patterson 1991, Wells 1999, Woolf 1998, MacMullen 2000, McElreath et al. 2003). Imperial and colonial studies also provide a glimpse into the political, economic, and social complexity of identity in multiple or pluralistic social settings. Although imperial and colonial studies often emphasize strategies to alter and/or eradicate indigenous identity, indigenous peoples also resist, persist, and appropriate “other” identities in order to negotiate their own specific agendas and goals (Patterson 1991). For example, the term “Romanization” is often used to describe the process through which indigenous cultures in the provinces and along the frontier were assimilated into the Roman Empire. Romanization has also been tied to the way in which these groups altered traditional tenets of Roman society (Woolf 1998). Nevertheless, in order to become truly enfranchised as a member of the populus romanus, individuals were required to follow a specific course through which they would eventually achieve the intellectual and moral qualities of true Romans, referred to as humanitus (Woolf 1998). Therefore, despite the accoutrements of Roman dress, architecture, and cuisine, being Roman was very much a state of mind. However, indigenous elites often stood to gain more (economically, politically, and socially) by adopting more tangible aspects of Roman civilization. Local constructs of Roman imperial identity can be observed archaeologically by a variety of changes in local practices, ranging from preparing porridge to baking bread, drinking mead to drinking wine, burying the dead to cremating them and then back to burying again, and constructing buildings from stone rather than earthworks. However, these changes do not necessarily conform to Roman concepts of being Roman and certainly do not satisfy the requirements of the populus romanus. Nevertheless, they reveal what local peoples perceived were the shared practices and values (e.g., settlement patterns, construction techniques, ceramics as well as other material goods, diet, beverages, mortuary practices, oral traditions and/or written language) of Roman civilization (Elton 1996, Woolf 1998, MacMullen 2000). Thus, identity, whether imperial or local, should not be viewed as a complete package of distinct traits to be either accepted or denied by the population as a whole. Instead, identity may be viewed as a transformational process through which individuals and groups attempt to negotiate when, how, why, and where they will participate in broader processes of social interaction. At 39

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least one primary consideration for adopting new identities or elements of other identities lies in whether they will be accepted at the local/community level—whether they will “play in Peoria,” so to speak. Irrespective of Roman conceptualizations of humanitus, indigenous elites and communities alike recognized that appropriating Roman identity was generally most advantageous when it was translated into meeting local goals and objectives within the immediate community. These types of studies also indicate that even when communities are under significant external economic, political, and social control, they are still capable of exercising some choice in the construction of their own identity by selecting some aspects of daily practice and discourse and refusing others. Imperial studies (Elton 1996, MacMullen 2000, Wells 1999, Woolf 1998) also challenge the concept of rigidly defined and impermeable sociopolitical boundaries. The discovery of imperial practices, artifacts, and features in areas well beyond the boundaries of provinces and/or colonies and prior to any significant imperial military or economic presence in those areas indicates people, objects, and ideas were frequently transported across political and cultural frontiers. Furthermore, the existence and persistence of this type of interaction prior to, during, and after imperial and colonial expansion indicate a local community-based origin for these pervasive and extensive networks. These data also reinforce ethnographic observations and archaeological inferences concerning the local origins and broad extent of social fields and networks among contemporary and prehistoric hunter-gatherers. They also suggest that such networks and fields play a significant role in the integration of practice and technology across vast distances and numerous cultural boundaries. For example, hunter-gatherer groups practicing very similar modes of subsistence across a large environmentally variable region are often difficult to distinguish as distinct cultural or ethnic identities in the archaeological record. Perhaps nowhere has this been better documented than among huntergatherers in the Central Kalahari of Botswana (Figure 2.1) located in south central Africa. Botswana covers approximately 581,730 square kilometers, which, according to the CIA World Factbook, is a region “slightly smaller than the state of Texas.” The climate is considered highly variable, arid to semi-arid with erratic rainfall tending to occur seasonally between the months of October and April as localized showers and thunderstorms. The mean annual rainfall ranges from more than 650 mm in the northeast to fewer than 250 mm in the southwest, droughts of considerable duration (several years) are frequent, and significant, if infrequent, floods may also occur 40

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fIgUre 2.1 Map of Botswana showing the Central Kalahari region (center), which is similar in size to Central and South Texas (after Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: Figure 2.1).

(BINCUNFCCC 2001: 16). Annual precipitation is greatest in northeastern Botswana, decreasing to semi-arid and arid conditions as one moves farther south and west (Figure 2.2). Although summer daytime temperatures are generally hot, with mean monthly maximum temperature ranges from 29.5 to 35°C (85 to 95°F), winter nighttime temperatures regularly drop to near freezing (BINCUNFCCC 2001: 17). The eastern and central Kalahari are typical of African savannas 41

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fIgUre 2.2 Average annual rainfall for Botswana (after BINCUNFCCC 2001: Figure 1.2).

dominated by grasses and low shrubs and punctuated with “islands” of trees, many of them acacia (Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: 15). In the Central Kalahari, interrelated San communities (bands) within the same ethnic group occupy distinct ranges or territories concentrated around major drainages (Figure 2.3). “Flexibility and mobility are the keys to adaptive success” and are conspicuous features of full-time forager subsistence and settlement patterns in the region. Technology is “portable, efficient, and functional,” design characteristics that are “maintainable or suited to the hunting of scattered game under continual demand” (Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: 17). We might also add that, in general, the material culture of these foraging groups is relatively sparse compared to more sedentary societies. According to Hitchcock and Bartram (1998: 17–18), the sum of material goods possessed by most adult Kua (Bushmen) individuals is defined primarily by male and female foraging kits. These represent the most ubiquitous 42

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material indicators of daily practice in that virtually every able-bodied adult possesses a kit. The male foraging assemblage, contained in a carrying bag made of skin, includes a digging stick, spear, bow, arrows, ropes, items used to repair arrows, a poison container (usually made of horn), and sometimes a metal axe (Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: 17). The female foraging kit, also contained in a skin bag or net, consists of a digging stick, cord, and occasionally bead-making implements, such as a drill and rubbing stone (Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: 17–18). With the exceptions of hunting implements in the male kit and bead-making implements in the female kit, both contain many of the same artifacts and are similar in form and function. The materials and tools of these foraging kits have several direct correlates to prehistoric hunter-gatherer artifacts and assemblages, such as projectile points, beads, bone and stone tools, and cordage. Archaeologically, however, with little or no relevant ethnographic data, these same artifacts may indicate little more concerning identity than the presence of men and women at the same site. Therefore, in terms of distinguishing specific identities at the com-

fIgUre 2.3 Overlapping ranges of San communities in the Central Kalahari focused around major drainages (after Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: Figure 2.4).

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munity scale, even inferences concerning daily practice played out along sex and age-related divisions can be ambiguous. In fact, practices within communities, such as divisions of labor, may be permeable at certain times and/or places and the identities of and interactions between individuals may be fluid, resulting in considerable mixing of material culture. Time, depositional setting, and a general paucity of material culture (much of which is not preserved) among hunter-gatherers may also obscure the archaeological visibility as well as the links among daily practice, social discourse, and artifacts that signal specific identities in the prehistoric record. Nevertheless, people can and do interact together in the same general area for a long enough period of time that they eventually produce archaeological correlates recognized by similar material culture in residential bases across several hundred or even thousands of square kilometers. By extension, there may be dozens of communities/bands (represented by dozens of residential base camps as well as other site types) that together form the social aggregate or cultural group. In addition, daily practice (hunting, food processing, and bead making) often leaves unambiguous material evidence (archaeological visibility) in the form of artifacts and features (stone and bone tools and ceramics, bone discard piles or beds, hearths, and shell middens). Thus, daily practice, as specific technological adaptations to the environment and in combination with the human tendency for differentiation, can reflect sociocultural identity in some way. In short, one might expect the distributions and material content of archaeological sites to have spatial distributions and material contents comparable with ethnographically defined groups occupying similar environmental regions. In fact, several cross-cultural ethnoarchaeological studies (e.g., Hegmon 1998; Sackett 1986, 1990; Stark et al. 2000; Wobst 1974) note stylistic variation among social groups. For example, Stark et al. (2000) observed differences in the stylistic decoration of ceramic pots from two small communities (villages) in the Philippines that were 2 kilometers apart, interacted frequently, and often intermarried. However, each community also constituted two separately bounded “regions,” possessing different sets of social and political alliances. Stark and colleagues (2000) document differences in painted and incised design styles and vessel shape for each village, noting that area consumers also recognized and discussed these differences. In terms of defining archaeological boundaries for social groups (social boundaries), “the existence of such differences between pottery-making communities is encouraging” (Stark et al. 2000: 303). However, as the study also 44

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notes, ceramic stylistic variation can develop in as few as four years and continue to change with time. This suggests that stylistic variation “may not be the most robust indicator of long-term group affiliation” (Stark et al. 2000: 304). Stark and colleagues (2000) conclude that a combined approach using several analytical techniques as well as ethnographic data yielded the most useful insights. Other cross-cultural ethnoarchaeological and archaeological studies (e.g., Dietler and Herbich 1998, Goodby 1998, Welsch and Terrell 1998) indicate that distinct artifact styles do not always reflect distinct cultural boundaries. Instead, artifacts may be hopelessly mixed in a variety of contemporaneous social, economic, and political contexts, or decorative styles may crosscut many different linguistic, political, environmental, and economic boundaries. This suggests “the kinds of data most often available to archaeologists and students of material culture lend themselves more directly to regional, comparative, and processual questions than they do to questions about local ethnographic ones” (Welsch and Terrell 1998: 74). This last statement also implies that ethnography and archaeology often result in different observations because each studies people at different temporal and spatial scales. But it largely begs the question: if identity is to be found wherever people are present, why is it so conspicuously absent in regions that are environmentally variable and inhabited by hunter-gatherers? Indeed, as MacEachern points out, “archaeological distributions of artifacts frequently occur over much larger territories than do the ethnic units that ethnographers study in the present,” adding that in Africa, archaeological constructs “are spread over regions often larger than modern states, within which scores of ethnic groups are now found” (MacEachern 1998: 113). Wiessner’s work among the Kalahari San (1983: 255) indicates they share approximately 90 percent of each others’ material culture, despite the presence of three mutually unintelligible languages spoken by groups dispersed across an area half the size of France (a region similar in size to Central and South Texas combined). Lemmonier (1986: 160) and Sackett (1990: 40–41) suggest the invisibility of social differentiation in the material record is due primarily to current limitations in archaeological methods and techniques. Thus, in the future, more technologically and methodologically sophisticated archaeologists will possess the fine-grained resolution necessary to observe the subtle signature of distinct social or cultural identities. However, although archaeologists of the future may possess greater technological advantages and, perhaps, a better grasp of sociocultural identity, they will still be faced with a similarly limited material record. 45

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Poor archaeological preservation aside, the quantity of prehistoric huntergatherer material culture was probably very limited to begin with, a point often expressed but rarely illustrated. However, in a study similar to Lee’s (1984), Bartram et al. (1991) documented an abandoned seasonal residential base camp occupied by several small Kua San families of the Central Kalahari after abandonment. This work shows that even shortly after abandonment, the material record was surprisingly sparse, reflecting little more than discrete concentrations of fire-cracked rocks (hearths), refuse (primarily bone), and ash pits (Figure 2.4). In fact, prehistoric hunter-gatherer sites in Texas contain these same elements, suggesting different forager groups in similar environmental regions live their lives in similar ways. For example, a comparison of a photo of a Hadza residential base camp (Figure 2.5 top) with a map of an abandoned Kua San campsite (Figure 2.5 bottom) and a photo of an Apache encampment in the American Southwest (Figure 2.6) shows some striking similarities. Despite the fact that these images span two continents, three cultures, and almost one hundred years, they approximate the homogeneity of material culture often noted among hunter-gatherers occupying similar environmental settings around the world. Although archaeologists and ethnographers recognize many huntergatherers’ practices and materials as similar, applying ethnographic analogy to archaeological contexts requires some critical thought, and the results may be just as vague as those produced solely from archaeological data. Alternatively, the application of archaeological analogy to ethnographic data is unlikely to result in a clear straightforward conclusion. Due to differing spatial and temporal orientations, archaeology and ethnography capture different aspects of identity, daily practice, and social interaction. For example, the ethnographer observes real-time daily practice and social interaction captured in a specific place and at a particular instant, whereas an archaeologist often observes (over a period of weeks, months, or even years) material culture across a site, area, or region that may represent generations of cumulative practices. Yellen (1977) made a similar observation almost thirty years ago while conducting ethnographic work among the !Kung in the northern Kalahari of Botswana. He noted that statements supposedly describing behavior patterns sometimes referred only to hypothetical rules that were not necessarily followed or were adhered to by individuals to varying degrees over time and across the landscape. He argued that archaeologists using ethnographic data must be aware of scalar divisions in time and space between group and individual behavior (Yellen 1977: 49). 46

fIgUre 2.4 Site map of Kua San residential base camp depicting only durable artifacts after abandonment: fire-cracked rocks (hearths), refuse (primarily bone), and ash pits (after Bartram et al. 1991: Figure 9a).

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fIgUre 2.5 Hadza residential base as it was occupied, showing huts, windbreaks, hearths, refuse (primarily bone), and ash pits (after Bartram et al. 1991: Figure 15 and Bunn 1991: cover illustration for Kroll and Price 1991).

To illustrate this point, Yellen presented two ethnographic models for the !Kung: the band approach and the individual approach. According to Yellen, a band or group consists of specific individuals tied together for a period of years to a particular territory and, thus, “groups are associated with specific areas, and yearly group movement repeatedly conforms to this pattern.” This rather loose definition of territory is viewed largely as a social adaptation to “the extremes of environmental variation and concomitant stress” that permits the population to shift in the face of environmental change (Yellen 1977: 40). Importantly, !Kung groups also view themselves as being organized in such a manner (Lee 1979). So in this instance, the ethnographic moment documents identity as a specific community of individuals organized around 48

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adaptations to a particular place over a certain amount of time and also acknowledges this organizational structure through self-ascription—the latter also a key aspect of ethnic identity. This appears to be a clear example of hunter-gatherer community identity and one that archaeologists could model spatially and, perhaps, temporally. However, Yellen plotted the areas covered by four adult male members of the Dobe group of the !Kung and found that only one of the four individuals even approximated the behavior suggested by the band model. In fact, the movements of most of these individuals extended beyond the bounds of the Dobe and into various other !Kung groups, where some of the men either visited their married children or actually maintained their own huts. A closer examination revealed that almost none of the adults in these men’s families were born within the Dobe range, yet all were considered part of the Dobe band (Yellen 1977: 41–42). Although the band level of organization was practiced and widely acknowledged, other more fundamental organizational forces (organized around individuals and families) were also at work. Both models appeared to work well in band territories of approximately 600 square kilometers during a typical annual cycle. However, in bad years

fIgUre 2.6 Apache encampment, American Southwest (Curtis 1903).

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during intense droughts all the waterholes within the community range sometimes went dry and people were forced beyond the territorial boundaries of the band. Yellen (1977: 44) found that the most practical answer was presented by the organizational form of the individual model. For example, selecting marriage partners from distant areas and discouraging more than two marriages within the same sibling group represents a particularly astute social strategy for maintaining the flexible unconstrained movement of individuals and families across large regions. This strategy also offers the widest potential residential alternatives and opportunities under virtually any conditions at any time (Yellen 1977: 44). Among the !Kung, those who possess the abilities to be flexible and choose correctly among a number of alternatives are held in high esteem. The admiration the !Kung have for these astute individuals is reflected in the term used to describe them, t’xudi kaus, or “masters of cleverness” (Yellen 1977: 47). Although the archaeological applications of such models are problematic, the implications of these “problems” provide a framework for understanding some aspects of sociocultural identity in the archaeological record. Yellen’s data provide evidence that the decisions of individuals and families dictate the social organization and subsistence and settlement patterns among groups in environmentally variable regions. Moreover, Yellen (1977: 50) states that hypotheses concerning individuals “are not subject to proof—one can only demonstrate whether or not the data tend to support them.” Thus, the results of testable hypotheses generated from models of hunter-gatherer behavior should reflect a range of likely or probable outcomes rather than a set of proofs. Similarly, statements or rules summarizing systems of residence and marriage patterns observed in the ethnographic present (as well as the past historic event) must be weighed against an archaeological record that may not reflect our expectations. Although people engage in patterned or structured behavior, the degree to which they maintain those patterns varies considerably from one situation to the next (Bourdieu 1990). Sociocultural identity then will not always appear to be constructed under rigid adherence to social rules and variation may be the rule. These examples illustrate some of the significant and fundamental issues that archaeologists must consider when integrating ethnographic and archaeological data. In very broad terms, these examples also suggest that “precise control is difficult in the best of cases and, the further back in time one goes, the broader the archaeological ‘instant’ becomes” (Yellen 1977: 50). The period of study spans both late prehistory and the early Historic Period (ca. A.D. 1300 to A.D. 1700), and the archaeology addressed represents, tem50

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porally, the closest prehistoric period to our own. Thus, the breadth of the “archaeological instant” has been somewhat minimized. Although ethnographic analogy and archaeological visibility remain challenging, a heightened awareness of these issues, as well as an expectation of significant variation through time and across space, can address some of these challenges. In addition, the three fundamental dimensions of hunter-gatherer identity introduced above—band/community, marriage/linguistic group, regional social field— reflect the broad, flexible, and varied character of identity that may once have existed in the study region. When combined, these identities and the data from which they were derived provide a basic framework or model for contextualizing prehistoric hunter-gatherer social interaction in the archaeological record.

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I n t ro d U C I n g t h e toya h Ph e n o m e n o n

T

he previous chapter introduced the complexity of distinguishing identity and interaction in the archaeological record, particularly among foragers who once inhabited large, environmentally variable regions. This complexity is abundantly apparent in the prehistory of the extreme southern portion of the Great Plains of North America, in two areas known today as Central and South Texas (Carr 1967). Central and South Texas combined cover approximately 25 percent of the state (174,000 sq. km) and are characterized by environmental diversity and wide seasonal fluctuations in precipitation and temperature (Ellis et al. 1995; Hall 1998; Hester 1981, 1995; Stahle and Cleveland 1995). Here archaeologists also recognize a distinct material culture, known as “Toyah,” dating to the very Late Prehistoric Period (sometime between A.D. 1250 and 1700) and ringed by several other Late Prehistoric material cultures (Figure 3.1). These cultures in some cases correspond to early Historic groups, such as Rockport Phase/Karankawa, Frankston Focus/Hasinai (Caddo), La Junta Phase/Abriaches, and dozens of Puebloan and/or post-Puebloan groups (Aten 1983, Boyd 1997, Collins 1971, Drass 1997, Hester 1995, Jelks 1962, Kelley 1947, Krieger 1946, Lehmer 1948, Mallouf 1990, Miller 2001, Perttula 1992, Perttula et al. 1995, Ricklis 1996, Suhm 1960, Turpin 1995). “Toyah” was first coined by J. Charles Kelley as the Toyah Focus of the Central Texas Aspect in 1947, refined by Suhm et al. in 1954, by Jelks in 1962, and again by Suhm and Shafer in 1965. Early on, Toyah was generally characterized by both a lithic (stone) and ceramic assemblage (Kelley 1947, Suhm et al. 1954). The lithic tool assemblage consists of Perdiz arrow points, beveled knives, scrapers, and various perforators made of chert (commonly called flint). Stone tools are produced by a process of reduction. Large pieces of chert (sometimes called a core or blank) are struck (knapped) until a specific shape (such as an arrowhead, knifeblade, scraper, or drill) is sculpted. The Toyah lithic assemblage (Figure 3.2) is also frequently described as a flake/

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fIgUre 3.1 Toyah and various material cultures and historic groups of the very Late Prehistoric and early Historic Periods, ca. A.D. 1250 and 1700 (Arnn 2007).

blade technology, meaning large flakes or prismatic blades are struck off of cores and then crafted into tools such as Perdiz points, perforators, or scrapers ( Johnson 1994: 269). The Toyah ceramic assemblage consists primarily of undecorated bonetempered bowls, constricted neck ollas, and, to a lesser extent, jars, often with buff (Leon Plain) or red (Doss Redware) slipped or burnished, oxidized, or brushed and punctated exteriors ( Johnson 1994: 187–210, Ricklis 1995a: 196–197) (Figure 3.3). Toyah ceramics are almost always recovered in pieces as potsherds rather than as whole vessels, suggesting a primarily undecorated utilitarian assemblage of bowls and ollas. However, it is likely that the weathered and fragmented condition of these sherds masks distinctions in terms of vessel form, decoration, and perhaps even entirely different wares, that is, prestige vs. utilitarian wares (Arnn 2005, 2007). Jelks (1962) elaborated on Kelley’s various spatial, temporal, and behavioral aspects of Toyah, emphasizing its sudden appearance, broad distribution, and apparent correspondence with bison. Early excavations at several 53

fIgUre 3.2 Toyah lithic assemblage from the Janee Site (41MN33): a. beveled knife; b. blade; c–d. scrapers; e–g. Perdiz arrow points; h. perforator/drill; i. ceramic sherds (Arnn 2007).

fIgUre 3.3 Various bone-tempered pottery forms from Toyah sites in Central and South Texas: A. bowl (41KM16); B. jar with vertical brushing under horizontal rows of punctations (41HY209); C–E. ollas (D has loop handles) (41LK201, 41RF21) (after Perttula et al. 1995: Figure 16). Also pictured are two bowls, the most common ceramic form known for the Edwards Plateau. Top bowl from 41TG346 (after Quigg and Peck 1995: Figure 5.38) and bottom bowl from 41KM16 (after Johnson 1994: Figure 99).

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Toyah sites noted bison bone, which led to a long-standing perception of Toyah peoples as bison hunters. However, some (Arnn 2007, Black 1986, Hester 1995, Johnson 1994) maintain the relationship between Toyah and bison may be overemphasized. Nonetheless, there is little doubt that Toyah is at least coincidental with greater numbers of bison throughout some portions of Texas sometime between A.D. 1200 and 1300 (Ahr 1998, Creel 1991, Dickens and Weiderhold 2003, Dillehay 1974, Huebner 1991). Toyah was first conceptualized as a “focus” (Kelley 1947) in the McKernean taxonomic sense. However, a short time later, others (Suhm and Jelks 1962, Hester 1968, Shafer 1971) pointed to significant differences they observed between Toyah and the preceding Austin Phase and Late Archaic Period ( Johnson 1994: 241). Toyah increasingly began to be characterized by the broad geographic distribution of the Toyah lithic assemblage, a specific association with bison, and the appearance of ceramics among Texas foragers. When combined, these characteristics suggested to many that Toyah was something different from previous prehistoric material cultures and that it warranted a new classification ( Johnson 1994: 241, Karbula 2003: 58). Later, Prewitt (1981, 1983) concluded that Toyah could be classified as a “phase” according to the Midwestern Taxonomic System. Prewitt’s Toyah Phase emphasized bison procurement and processing evidenced by the Toyah lithic assemblage of Perdiz points, beveled knives, various scrapers, and bone tools. Caddoan ceramics recovered from Toyah sites on the Lampasas Cut Plain and the western Blackland Prairie also suggested contact with Caddo peoples to the east. Prewitt (1983) also proposed a north-to-south movement or migration of bison as well as people beginning sometime in the thirteenth century. Excavations conducted at sites (41CC131, 41RN169, 41TG91, 41TG346) along the Concho and Colorado Rivers on the northern periphery of the Edwards Plateau in Central Texas seemed to support a Toyah emphasis on bison hunting and processing and expansion to the south (Creel 1990, Quigg and Peck 1995, Treece et al. 1993). Prewitt’s Toyah “phase” represented a “remarkably reliable list of traits and a great improvement on anything that had gone before,” particularly in terms of emphasizing the difference between Toyah and the preceding Austin Phase. However, most of the supporting data came from sites on the Blackland Prairie immediately east and northeast of the Edwards Plateau ( Johnson 1994: 241). Not surprisingly, bison bone was often recovered in these sites, located, as they were, in or adjacent to large herbivore habitats (e.g., prairies and the southern margins of the Rolling Plains). These data fit well with Prewitt’s (1983) model, based on radiocarbon assays of Austin and Toyah 56

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Phase sites, in which bison-hunting populations from the north migrated south following herds into Central and South Texas as the bison responded to environmental change (i.e., Dillehay 1974). However, other Late Prehistoric sites (41BC114, 41JW8, 41ZV155) were being excavated slightly farther south in Central and South Texas. These sites were not in or adjacent to prime bison habitat and did not display the same high-frequency of bison bone as Toyah sites located farther to the north and east (Black 1986, Greer 1976, Hester 1975). Hester (1975: 107) noted twentysix species represented in the faunal assemblage from site 41ZV155, stating, “It is possible that the major meat sources were the small mammals—the rabbits and rodents.” It soon became clear that Toyah artifacts occurred throughout most of Central and South Texas, regardless of the presence of bison bone in site assemblages. Prewitt’s concept of “phase” was subsequently challenged by Black (1986), who argued that Toyah represented a rapid and broad distribution of various aspects of Toyah material culture across several environmentally diverse areas. Black suggested technology, rather than people, had moved across the region, a situation more closely resembling Willey and Phillips’s (1958) concept of a “horizon” or “tradition.” Cumulatively, these data suggested that “Toyah” was a rather vague term for an increasingly varied material culture. For example, what was the identity, archaeological or otherwise, of a Late Prehistoric component consisting of a Toyah lithic assemblage and a Caddo ceramic assemblage? Karbula (2003), citing Ricklis and Collins’s (1994) use of the Toyah “Interval” (referring to a specific period of time, rather than culture), suggests that a Culture Ecology approach, focusing on adaptations to varied environmental conditions and zones, may be the best research orientation for investigating Toyah. Nevertheless, a “direct correlation is drawn between the procurement processing of large prairie/savannah ungulates (bison) and the spread of the Toyah tool assemblage” (Karbula 2003: 58). This latter perspective is pervasive among many archaeologists in Texas. Others (Black et al. 1997) emphasized specific features, such as earth ovens and burned rock middens, at some sites as evidence for specialized activities. Although the purpose of many sites is unclear, features at these sites are associated with processing specific types of plants, primarily geophytes, in cooking features or ovens (Black et al. 1997, Dering 1999). Most of the nutritional value of geophytes is found in the portion of the plant that lies below the ground surface (e.g., bulbs). However, several species of geophytes, as well as tubers, must be cooked for several hours, even days, in order to neutralize 57

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poisons and render the plants edible. Many burned rock features, particularly burned rock middens, represent cumulative cooking episodes focused primarily on plant rather than animal resources. Although some of these issues can be addressed at very small scales, local or community, of analysis, data must often be compared at larger scales in order to distinguish difference and mark similarity between different sites. Toyah is generally conceptualized as a regional phenomenon, but investigated at a very limited site-specific scale. For example, although migration and bison figure prominently in the minds of many, and evidence from some sites appears to support this, other sites point to increasing specialization and intensification of plants, broad spectrum foraging, or evidence combinations of all three. This suggests that diversity, rather than homogeneity, is a fundamental and significant issue. In order to test this hypothesis, specific artifact types, features, and environments must be compared at multiple scales throughout the region. LeRoy Johnson Jr. (1994), in perhaps the most thoughtful discussion of Toyah to date, views Toyah as both a “Shared Toyah Culture” and a “Classic Toyah Culture” (Figure 3.4). The Shared or general Toyah Culture Area encompasses a vast portion of the state and is characterized by numerous sites containing at least some elements of the Toyah lithic, ceramic, and faunal assemblages (e.g., Rockport Phase/Karankawa and/or the Cielo Complex, detailed in Chapter 6). The Classic Toyah Culture area is much smaller in size, is centered on the Edwards Plateau, and is delineated by sites containing all or most of the lithic and ceramic assemblages and faunal assemblages containing bison bone. The assemblages and artifact types in both areas tend to grade into one another along their mutual boundaries. Johnson (1994) also specifically addresses the variation in material culture, or “regionalism,” found among Toyah sites in the Shared Area by presenting specific examples. These include the Rockport Phase/Karankawa-style asphaltum decorated ceramics found in some South Texas Toyah sites (41JW8 and 41LK201) and various Caddo-style ceramics observed in supposed Toyah sites (41BL23, 41CV41, 41CV48, 41CV344, 41HI105, 41ML46, 41WM71) on the Blackland Prairie and Lampasas Cut Plain. Nevertheless, Johnson states that “it would be misleading to overemphasize the differences among Toyah artifact collections, however strong some of them may seem—except where Toyah stone artifacts occur largely with non-Classic Toyah pottery (or without any ceramics at all),” as the result of borrowing from “ethnically different neighbors of a few minor elements of tool or vessel shape and surface treatment—including decorative techniques” ( Johnson 1994: 268–269). However, ethnographic and environmental data indicate that hunter58

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fIgUre 3.4 The Toyah region defined by Johnson (1994), depicting the Shared or General Toyah Culture Area surrounding the Classic Toyah Area (after Johnson 1994: Figure 105).

gatherer bands often share practices and a common language, and they intermarry as part of a larger social aggregate (e.g., marriage/linguistic group). Alternatively, different subsistence practices attuned to different ecological zones should reflect some variation, however slight, among the combined practices of a marriage/linguistic group. Therefore, the fact that most sites in the region possess at least some elements of Classic Toyah material culture suggests permeable social boundaries and networks that crosscut the region. Moreover, the pervasiveness of this interaction is visible from the smallest scale of local communities and bands, to marriage/linguistic group areas, as well as to the largest, regional, scale of social field. Although most archaeologists acknowledge some variation in subsistence across the region, the presence of bison in Toyah sites is repeatedly emphasized (Black 1986; Creel 1990; Johnson 1994; Karbula 2003; Prewitt 1981, 59

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1983; Quigg 1997; Quigg and Peck 1995). This perception gained significant momentum with the publication of a seminal article on the presence and absence of bison in Texas. Tom Dillehay (1974), after reviewing data on bison bone from various paleontological and archaeological sites covering several thousand years, proposed that bison abundance across Texas fluctuated and this variation was likely due to environmental changes. Archaeologists were quick to focus on the latest bison presence and absence periods, which suggested absence during the Austin Phase and presence during the Toyah Phase (Dillehay 1974). Later paleoenvironmental reconstructions (Blum and Valastro 1992, Bousman 1998, Bryant and Holloway 1985, Collins et al. 1993, Cooke et al. 2003, Johnson and Goode 1994, Toomey 1993, Toomey et al. 1993) also appeared to support some aspects of Dillehay’s model in specific areas at specific times. These findings were generally viewed as confirmation that sometime around A.D. 1250 environmental changes on the Southern Plains increased the extent of bison habitat and led to the return of bison throughout most of Texas. Thus, the differences between the Late Prehistoric I Period (Austin) and Late Prehistoric II Period (Toyah) could be explained by a new influx of technologies and/or peoples following bison as they returned to and spread across most of Texas. However, despite a substantial increase in faunal data and related work by others (Ahr 1998, Dickens and Wiederhold 2003, Huebner 1991), Dillehay’s original model (ca. 1974) was never tested. Furthermore, most paleoenvironmental reconstructions rely on data from a very limited number of locations in order to extrapolate conditions for the entire region. Nevertheless, the emphasis on climate change and bison permeates almost every facet of Toyah archaeology, resulting in a homogenizing effect in terms of culture within the region. Where archaeologists have observed and/or imposed homogeneity, historians and ethnohistorians (Campbell 1979, 1988; Foster 1995, 1998; Hickerson 1994; Johnson and Campbell 1992; Kenmotsu 2001; Kenmotsu and Wade 2002; Wade 2003) have documented heterogeneity, identifying dozens of indigenous culture groups in the Toyah region that spoke several different languages. Collins (1999) documents no fewer than one hundred and sixty names for Native American groups recorded during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Central and South Texas. Early European accounts (Alonso de León Expedition, 1689; Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, 1528–1536; Bosque-Larios Expedition, 1675; Castillo-Martín Expedition, 1650; Guadalajara Expedition, 1654; Mendoza-López Expedition, 1683–1684; Joutel, 1687; Salas, 1629; and Terán Expedition, 1691–1692) note that, despite vast distances and different languages, indigenous peoples 60

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traded, formed alliances, visited, and intermarried with one another. Unfortunately, many of these accounts are vague, consisting of little more than a date, group name, location, and anecdotal observations (Campbell 1988, Kenmotsu and Wade 2002). Nonetheless, historic Native Americans almost invariably identified themselves and others as members of specific groups, indicating that identity figured prominently in various social, economic, and political arenas, and there is no reason to suspect this was not the case during prehistory. In short, archaeologists observe cultural homogeneity in the material record and historians see heterogeneity in the historical documents for the region as a whole. Although archaeology’s focus on chronology, subsistence, and technology has contributed significantly to our understanding of Toyah, these lines of inquiry have not addressed the differences in historic and archaeological interpretations of Toyah nor have they been able to explain the social mechanisms responsible for the Toyah phenomenon. This has led some (Arnn 2005) to suggest that archaeologists must focus on more substantive research issues, such as identity and interaction. Similarly, Collins (1995: 385) suggests the primary issue that defines the Toyah debate lies in archaeologists’ ability to demonstrate ethnicity in the prehistoric record, adding that this is “the kind of anthropological issue so rare in the history of Central Texas archeology. Because it is both intriguing and substantive. . . .” However, ethnicity seems an unlikely avenue of investigation based, as it is, in self-ascription (Baumann 2004, Jones 1997). Archaeologists, after all, can never interview living individuals. As Hester (1981: 120) noted, dozens of groups, or naciones, were recorded, but there is little information explaining the basis for these affiliations (e.g., kinship, language, religion, geography, or political alliance). Nor is it clear whether the term naciones refers to individual bands, communities, social groups, ethnic groups, tribes, clans, or factions. In fact, any or all of these classifications could be incorporated within the various definitions for an ethnic group ( Jones 1997: 61). The widespread recognition of significant variation in Toyah material culture is a fairly recent phenomenon. Nevertheless, as multiple lines of evidence are increasingly brought to bear on Toyah studies, variation is becoming more apparent. The following chapter addresses some of these issues and assesses current models of Toyah.

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n general, archaeological models of Toyah link its origins and character to changes in environmental conditions sometime around A.D. 1250 that led to the return of bison to large portions of Texas (Black 1986, Creel 1990, Hester 1995, Jelks 1962, Johnson 1994, Kelley 1986, Karbula 2003, Lintz et al. 1993, Quigg 1997, Quigg and Peck 1995, Ricklis and Collins 1994, Suhm 1957, Treece et al. 1993). Based on this premise, two models have emerged since the 1980s to explain the presence of Toyah material culture. One model suggests that Toyah is a widespread technological adaptation, or “techno-complex,” related to the hunting and processing of bison. In this scenario, Toyah represents the transmission of tools, technology, and ideas among many different, but local, ethnic groups across the region (Black 1986, Collins 1995, Hester 1995, Prewitt 1981, Ricklis 1992). Thus, the key to understanding the distribution and differentiation of Toyah material culture is linked primarily to the range of bison, as well as the specific environmental determinants for bison habitat. The primary driving mechanism behind this culture ecology approach is environmental change resulting in an increase in the range and abundance of bison and corresponding human adaptations in subsistence and technology reflected in the material record. Accordingly, the emergence of Toyah material culture is considered a direct reflection of changes in the regional environment that were conducive to an increase in both the abundance and the distribution of bison. Toyah material culture is viewed as correspondent with the distribution of bison at a local or community level. Thus, the rapid and widespread distribution of related Toyah/bison ideas and technology was transmitted via “diffusion” among local indigenous social groups as large numbers of bison moved into the region (Ricklis 1994). This model implicitly relies on extensive and, one might also argue, intensive social interaction in order to spread the bison-related techno-complex.

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However, it posits no social or cultural mechanisms for the transfer of technology and ideas beyond diffusion. In addition, it views communities and/ or groups within the region as spatially fixed entities (within their subsistence range) on the landscape. The absence of mechanisms to explain culture change is a common criticism of culture ecology models in general (Bernardini 2005). However, viewing people as fixtures on the landscape is often attributed to the culture area concept of the culture history approach in which historical groups were often viewed as direct ancestors of the original inhabitants of specific areas (Bernardini 2005, Jones 1997). As Alexander Lesser (Lesser 1977 as cited in Mintz 1985: 76) pointed out nearly forty years ago, it is erroneous to assume that human communities exist either in isolation or as fixed points in space. Models of the “primitive isolate” as Lesser stated harken back to the earlier days of nineteenth-century evolutionists, and such models are now widely recognized as not only difficult to conceive but also impossible to find (Lesser 1961: 94). Furthermore, neither the archaeological record from sites throughout the region nor accounts from numerous early historical documents indicate that indigenous peoples were fixed or that they lived in isolation. Many archaeological sites in Texas possess at least some evidence of long-distance interaction in the form of exotic artifacts and materials (e.g., ceramics, obsidian, marine shell), and historical accounts describe groups separated by hundreds of miles regularly visiting each other for weeks or months (Foster 1995, 1998; Kelley 1955; Wade 2003). Instead, these combined data (Campbell 1979, 1988; Foster 1995, 1998; Hickerson 1994; Johnson and Campbell 1992; Kelley 1955, 1986; Kenmotsu 2001; Kenmotsu and Wade 2002; Wade 2003) point to wellintegrated social networks among more or less mobile peoples that resulted in the broad distribution of Toyah material culture. The second Toyah model suggests Toyah material culture was spread directly by an ethnic group or groups. In this scenario, the broad distribution of Toyah material culture represents plains bison hunters from the north following bison south as they “returned” to Texas. Thus, the adoption of Toyah material assemblages is due to migration and population replacement of local communities and/or direct contact between local ethnic groups and wandering plains bison hunters ( Johnson 1994, Kelley 1986, Kenmotsu 2001, Prewitt 1981, Wade 2003). Although this model also stresses environmental change and bison, it primarily emphasizes the role of people as direct agents of change. Not surprisingly, the model focuses its attention on chronology and migration to explain the sudden appearance of Toyah assemblages. However, despite early compilations of radiocarbon assays that appeared to support a generally north-to-south trend in the appearance of Toyah arti63

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facts and assemblages (Prewitt 1983), later assays indicated an almost simultaneous appearance of Toyah culture throughout the region (Ricklis 1994). It is also important to note that these compilations were based on radiocarbon dates that were not as precise as later absolute dating techniques, such as accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS) assays. The precision of these earlier assays often ranged from one hundred to one hundred and fifty years (plus or minus) of a specific date. When the combined range of variation (two hundred and three hundred years) is compared to the four hundred-year Toyah Interval, these dates span ambiguously large portions of time, offering little temporal specificity. Another complicating factor in these earlier and formative discussions of Toyah chronology is the implicit and, in some cases ( Johnson 1994: 239), explicit interpretation of Toyah material culture as an exclusively prehistoric phenomenon. For example, in Johnson’s (1994: 237–240) discussion of the Buckhollow Site fifteen radiocarbon samples of wood charcoal from hearths were presented. Of these, more than half (n=8) fell within the Historic Period (post-conquest A.D. 1521), even after the relative area under the probability distribution was applied ( Johnson 1994: 238–239). However, as Johnson points out, there were inconsistencies in results from the two labs used. Despite corrected dates and tree-ring calibration conducted on the fifteen samples, Johnson states, “Of course, nonstatistical information can sometimes be used to help cull the intercepts, as when historic-period intercepts can be rejected when the site context is entirely prehistoric” (1994: 237). Although Johnson rejected the significance of the Historic Period dates from the Buckhollow Site, he nevertheless documented and reported all fifteen radiocarbon samples, making it possible to review these dates and discuss his decision to discard them. Although it is true that none of these dates were AMS assays and thus the precision of all these dates is somewhat questionable, Johnson was reluctant to accept results from only one of these labs: “Since Toyah culture is known to be prehistoric, the present University of Texas assays are probably less reliable than the Beta analytic dates because they produced historic, or nearly historic, calibrated ages” (1994: 239). Clearly, Johnson conceptualized Toyah as a prehistoric culture and the absence of historic artifacts at this site contributed to his reluctance to accept Historic Period intercepts in the dating results. However, the precision of absolute dating techniques has improved considerably since the Buckhollow Site was excavated, and AMS dates from several Toyah Interval sites in Central Texas postdate Johnson’s terminus for Toyah and call into question his concept of a strictly prehistoric material culture. Three Toyah residential sites (Varga, 41ED28; Flat Rock, 41KM69; Little 64

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Paint, 41KM226), excavated fewer than seventy-five miles from the Buckhollow Site, yielded AMS, Optical Stimulation Luminescence (OSL), and Thermal Luminescence (TL) dates well within the Historic Period. Quigg (2008: 535) reported that 54 percent of the Toyah component dates from the Varga Site “are younger than 400 B.P., postdating the arrival of Europeans in Southern Texas.” This indicates that Toyah components at the site “could easily have extended into the Protohistoric period.” This conclusion is further substantiated by the recovery of two Guerrero, or mission, points and a modified flake made from glass at the Varga Site (Quigg 2008: 293). Preliminary findings from the Little Paint and Flat Rock sites in Kimble County report similar results with 50 percent of AMS (41KM226) and 50 percent of OSL and TL dates (41KM69) postdating the arrival of Europeans in South and Central Texas. In addition, excavations conducted by the Southern Texas Archaeological Association report that the upper deposits of a Toyah component in a rock shelter in Bandera County (41BN207) yielded samples of charred remains with calibrated dates of A.D. 1460 to 1660 (Cal BP 490 to 290) +/- 40 BP and A.D. 1480 to 1660 (Cal BP 470 to 280) +/- 40 BP, respectively (McKenzie 2009: 2). Therefore, regardless of European artifacts occurring in Toyah sites, it now appears that several intact Toyah components date to the Historic Period. The increasing number of Historic Period intercepts from sites within the Classic Toyah Area is difficult to ignore. Although the precise impact of Europeans in this region at this time is debatable, there seems little point in dismissing 50 percent of the dates from a Toyah site because we believe Toyah to be prehistoric. Still, few would argue that Toyah appears suddenly across a large area, evidence for some (Prewitt 1983, Johnson 1994, Kelley 1986, Mallouf 1999) of migration. The migration model does address the issue of culture change and the perceived uniformity of Toyah material culture by suggesting the migration of a single ethnic group or perhaps several similar ethnic groups. However, this hypothesis is generally presented with little or no evidence indicating a corresponding abandonment in adjacent regions. Conversely, there is little or no discussion of where displaced groups from Central and South Texas, likely a sizable population, may have gone once inundated with migrants from the north (Prewitt 1983, Kelley 1986, Mallouf 1999). Nor has the subject of migration been critically addressed in terms of whether these movements were a large, discrete, single event or a pattern of successive movements by several small groups referred to as “serial” migration (Bernardini 2005: 34). Whereas the first model suggests people stayed in one place and adapted 65

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to a changing environment and the material culture moved among them, the second suggests people were already adapted to a specific prey and simply moved into a similar environmental setting in an adjacent region, bringing their technology and practice (culture) with them. Nonetheless, both models share the same key driver (climate change) in terms of culture change. However, the evidence for climate change comes almost entirely from proxy paleoenvironmental data recovered in areas and regions outside the Classic Toyah Area (Central and South Texas). Therefore, these models of Toyah are based almost entirely on untested correlations among climate change, the simultaneous appearance of bison, and homogenous Toyah material culture. Moreover, the development of these models has progressed little beyond the basic statements and framework presented above. In all fairness, recent discussions of migration theory (Bernardini 2005, Burmeister 2000) indicate that the somewhat vague character of these models may be endemic to archaeological concepts of origin and migration in general rather than Toyah origins specifically. As Burmeister (2000) was forced to admit, archaeologists lack even a general definition of migration. Therefore, if migration is to be regarded as a substantive research issue, this line of inquiry will require more development. Furthermore, if we accept that no group lives in absolute isolation, then it is implicit that whether they moved or developed in situ, they did so in interaction with others, all of whom possessed various distinct identities—a point that is also consistently not addressed in these models. Both models hinge on a monocausal explanation. Essentially, a single regional environmental catalyst (climate change resulting in the movement of bison herds) is used to provide an “either/or” explanation for the widespread and sudden appearance of Toyah. Either Toyah were bison hunters moving with the herds or bison moved into Texas and among local groups. Regardless of which model is selected, Toyah is frequently explained in a word: bison.

CULtUraL eCoLogy, envIronment, and soCIaL InteraCtIon The cultural ecology approach to hunter-gatherer studies has been described as a means of developing and/or demonstrating “simple correlations between gross dietary and environmental variables” and various human attempts to optimize them (Kelly 1995: 66). Although this approach often results in robust data (see Binford 2001), it has also been criticized for relegating all social interaction to the level of subsistence practice (Flannery 1972). “The result 66

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has been an increasingly mechanistic view of the aboriginal forager as capable only of gastronomic calculation and animated by nothing more than a presumed prowess at resource optimization” (McGuire and Hildebrandt 2005: 696). This approach is assailable on a number of different points (see McGuire and Hildebrandt 2005 for a summary), but a key sticking point is that cultural ecology models impose spatial and conceptual restrictions on the environmental settings they are attempting to define. For example, if archaeologists focus specifically on a single site, they may miss significant influencing factors that occurred outside or external to that site. As the eminent biologist Edward O. Wilson points out, ecologists face precisely the same problem with ecosystems when they attempt to determine immeasurable dynamic relationships among species (some of which may be largely unknown) in a specific environmental setting (Wilson 1998: 84). Given the complexity of ecological systems and the head start ecologists have in studying them, there is no reason to believe archaeologists are any better at reconstructing ecosystems than ecologists. Nevertheless, archaeologists continue to hammer out models, many of them informed by relatively recent ethnographic data, that are intended to predict the type of subsistence and/or mobility practiced by hunter-gatherers in more or less (generally less) specific environments (Binford 2001, Kelly 1995). To their credit, some archaeologists (Binford 1980, Lightfoot 1983) have stated that seasonal rounds, sedentism, foraging, collecting, and storage should be viewed as points along a continuum. That is, a group may select any strategy or variation of these strategies that is most advantageous under specific conditions in a specific environment at a specific time. What is important to remember here is the immediacy of local environmental conditions and social relationships in a community. In short, the behavior at the community level should be conceptualized as small-scale, short-term, local, and tactical (highly situational) adjustments to seasonal environmental conditions within the community range over the course of a year (Ellis et al. 1995: 408–409). Nevertheless, small-scale communities are also affected by events occurring at larger (i.e., area and regional) scales. Therefore, archaeologists should also consider how hunter-gatherers mitigated variable environmental conditions through large-scale and long-term strategies that covered vast distances and remained in effect all year or even over several generations (Ellis et al. 1995: 408–409). This is particularly true in the environmentally variable regions previously discussed (e.g., Central and South Texas, portions of sub–Saharan Africa, and portions of Australia). Thus, despite the imme67

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diacy with which hunter-gatherers responded to local conditions, as Binford (2001: 29) points out, “hunter-gatherer behavior appeared to exhibit regularities that were at least influenced, if not caused, by large-scale environmental cyclicities.” In short, hunter-gatherers lived in a world of multiple and interwoven ecological and social scales. This is precisely the point Lesser made in 1961 when discussing the rarity of isolated cultures and introducing the concept of social fields to an American audience. In short, there is always an “other” and studying a single community or archaeological site simply cannot address this most basic issue of interaction. This aspect of social and ecological interconnectedness among foragers has been recognized as a fundamental element in the concept of “risk pooling” (Binford 2001: 38, Smith and Boyd 1990: 179). Risk pooling has been described as a frequency-dependent phenomenon in which success or failure is “based on the frequency of interaction and the accumulation of knowledge about the disposition of potential group members either to share or not to share, to cooperate or not to cooperate” (Binford 2001: 38). According to Binford (2001: 38), engaging in risk pooling, or deciding not to, is a fundamental form of “ideology” that is particularly important in terms of the its ability to integrate the group. Although some may object to Binford’s (2001) rather narrow definition of “ideology,” it is similar to Barth’s (1998: 6) concept of ethnic or group membership in which people must have some knowledge of each other in order to evaluate and judge the actions of co-members and see themselves as all “playing the same game.” Both concepts rely on a learned behavioral baseline stemming from the ability to recognize similarity and mark difference within a specific social context. Similarly, Bourdieu (1977, 1990) proposed that all knowledge and social interaction results from a recursive process in which individuals present their distinct ideas or concepts to each other and then, between them, construct “objects of knowledge” that reflect common, but not necessarily equal, elements of both. The objects of knowledge constructed and held in common among individuals are significant in that they provide a shared meaning, as well as the basis for expectations or, as Binford suggests, “ideology.” These concepts are not new and many stem from the French School of Sociology founded by Emile Durkheim approximately one hundred years ago. Bourdieu’s concept of shared meaning constructed between people harkens back to a protégé of Durkhiem, Marcel Mauss, who wrote a short but provocative book, The Gift, first published in 1925. Mauss saw the basis for social organization as a reciprocal and recursive social process in which 68

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something is exchanged among individuals and/or groups (a “gift”) and a relationship constructed. These concepts are also consistent with the process of identity construction—distinguishing similarity and difference in interaction and establishing referential meaning and, by extension, behavioral expectations in order to negotiate goals and outcomes among individuals and groups. This process is fundamental to social organization due to its integrative capacity in terms of the formation of a group/community. However, ideology and identity within a community are largely a matter of daily practice (second nature). In interactions beyond the community integrative “in-group,” concepts may have little or no meaning to others (that’s why they are called “others”) and interaction can become exponentially more complex. Furthermore, instances will invariably arise when, in order to address local issues, a group or members of a group must adopt and use a broader sociocultural baseline as well as identities in interaction with others beyond the immediate community. For example, the inability to cooperatively manage various local problems (particularly resource shortages and/or displacement due to droughts or floods) through social interaction with others could produce a domino effect in which many more groups and social aggregates could potentially be affected by shortages, displacement, and warfare occurring hundreds of kilometers from their community range. Thus, the process of forming behavioral expectations and/or a behavioral baseline through identity and social interaction in order to successfully negotiate tactical (short-term/local) outcomes also has broader strategic (long-term/regional) implications. How then should environmental and behavioral data (derived primarily from ethnographic sources) be used to frame the archaeological record? First, environmental data should be detailed enough to describe important variables present in biotic regions and subregions occupied by human social communities (Ellis et al. 1995). For example, archaeologically, community ranges in arid areas may be quite extensive with small residential bases confined almost exclusively to reliable water sources. But sites, particularly residential base camps, may also be widely dispersed in order to avoid depleting other resources within the territory too rapidly. Alternatively, in areas of the same region that receive significantly more rainfall, large residential bases may be regularly spaced throughout the area in order to take advantage of a more abundant and equitable distribution of water and resources. Second, ethnographic data from similar regions around the world can provide some insight into defining prehistoric community ranges in the archaeological record. As Burke (2004: 193) points out, there are two ways to use 69

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ethnographic data to study the past: the direct ethnographic approach and, “in the absence of relevant situations, the use of general principles drawn from a comparative study of hunter-gatherer societies in a wide variety of situations.” Burke goes on to suggest that general principles may also be drawn from selected regional samples and/or from single ethnographic case studies. With respect to the Toyah Interval in Central and South Texas, sub– Saharan Africa presents an obvious choice for at least three reasons. First, some of the most recently settled hunter-gatherers in the world reside in these regions. Thus, many older members of these groups were born and raised as highly mobile hunter-gatherers and possess recent knowledge of a foraging lifestyle. Second, many areas in this region possess remarkably similar climatic regimes to those found in Central and South Texas, suggesting analogous environmental conditions. These include mixed grassland and parkland savannas that still sustain large herds of migratory herbivores that are, generally, comparable to bison. Third, small sub–Saharan Africa hunter-gatherer communities were integrated into broad social networks cross-cutting linguistic, political, and religious boundaries and traversing vast regions. Together, these data from countries such as Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, and Tanzania provide an interesting heuristic device for examining prehistoric hunter-gatherer behavior in Texas. However, as is the case with the ecological models and behavioral templates discussed above, ethnographic analogy cannot be applied uncritically. As Kelly points out, there is an inherent risk for anthropologists in the “familiar fallacy of analogy.” In applying ethnographic analogies: [T]hey seek to reconstruct an original human society by finding conservative societies that have preserved their prehistoric social organizations, or by subtracting the effects of colonialism from hunter-gatherers encapsulated by the expanding world system, and by attempting to distill the diversity among ethnographically known hunter-gatherers into its essential characteristics. (Kelly 1995: 335)

Instead, Kelly suggests, it is “highly possible, even likely, that modern diversity stems from original diversity in foraging adaptations of behaviorally modern humans” (1995: 337). Thus, diversity, rather than homogeneity, must be uppermost in the minds of archaeologists when considering environmental and behavioral frames of reference for hunter-gatherers. Finally, with respect to linkages among behavior, environment, and the archaeological record, subsistence and settlement practices are not simply knee70

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jerk reactions to environmental stimuli. According to most ethnographic accounts, foragers did not live in isolation and they accumulated significant knowledge of other communities and groups through frequent and intense social interaction resulting from friendship, marriage, trade, and alliance relationships. Many of these relationships appear to be based on subtle, but complex factors such as complementarity (see McGuire and Hildebrandt 2005) and reciprocity that both require and reinforce interaction. Furthermore, there is no reason to believe that similar interaction did not occur among prehistoric foragers. For example, Rossen and Dillehay (2004) show that, as early as 12,500 years ago, hunter-gatherers in southern Chile alternated between broadspectrum foraging and specialized, logistically oriented collecting. Comparisons between contemporary local plants and archaeobotanical evidence from the Monte Verde Site suggest that seasonal variability in plants produced abundance throughout the year for semi-sedentary hunter-gatherers practicing flexible subsistence strategies (Rossen and Dillehay 2004). Furthermore, the presence of exotic construction and craft materials and a welldeveloped and versatile pharmacopoeia of medicinal plants indicate that “the procurement of local plants operated alongside a system for gaining access to nonlocal plants” (Rossen and Dillehay 2004: 332–333). Although many were edible (such as kelp), most are known today through ethnographic study for their medicinal value (Rossen and Dillehay 2004: 326). In short, these semi-sedentary foragers were integrated into a social network or field far beyond their annual subsistence range or community and for purposes other than subsistence. The basis for this field of social relations appears to have been a thriving trade in medicinal plants between such divergent habitats as the high Andean grassland (puna) and coastal salt marshes. Rossen and Dillehay (2004) also point to the social and political implications for differentiation among groups, as well as individuals, participating in such a network and the opportunity for incipient high-status individuals to emerge based on curative knowledge and/or skill in the selection and use of medicinal plants (Rossen and Dillehay 2004: 333). It is precisely this type of conceptual model integrating environmental, ethnographic, and archaeological data at both a local and regional scale that can inform us of human behavior. It also demonstrates the significance of context and the “utility of maintaining the flexibility of a synthetic particularistic approach to hunter-gatherer resource use” (Rossen and Dillehay 2004: 332). Although poor preservation often limits archaeologists’ abilities to reconstruct similar aspects of social interaction in Texas, exotic artifacts (e.g., marine shells, obsidian, and hematite) provide tantalizing clues to the exis71

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tence of similar long-distance networks. Some ethnohistorians and archaeologists (Hall 1998; Kenmotsu 2001; Kelley 1947, 1955; Kibler 2005; Wade 2003) also suggest that this type of interaction presented an opportunity for individuals to garner significant status and prestige—both within their own local communities, as well as among others at a broader spatial and temporal scale.

CULtUraL eCoLogy and toyah modeLs: not as sImPLe as It Looks The Toyah models outlined above present at least three significant issues pertaining to hunter-gatherer archaeological studies in Texas: 1) most investigations do not use multiple spatial and temporal scales beyond the site level when modeling hunter-gatherer subsistence, settlement, and technology; 2) untested models, context, or assumptions are often implicitly accepted—for example, climate change, Dillehay’s (1974) bison presence/absence model, the application of the Austin Phase to areas beyond the Blackland Prairie and Lampasas Cut Plain, the homogeneity of Toyah material culture, and Toyah as a specifically prehistoric phenomenon; and 3) discussions of social mechanisms that might explain the distribution of material culture are conspicuously absent. In short, little or no attempt is made either to address variation, interaction, and identity or to integrate these issues into more comprehensive models. Furthermore, there is an almost intractable focus on chronology, technology, and subsistence as primary research issues. Nevertheless, cultural ecology offers excellent opportunities to observe daily practice at the community or local level because it focuses on the nuts and bolts details (subsistence and technology) of everyday life. Ecological modeling at the regional scale may also offer insights into opportunities, as well as the challenges presented by large-scale social networks. But the more general a model, the more ambiguous the results. In general, a combination of simplistic modeling and/or ignoring basic data in favor of untested assumptions has muted the potential effectiveness of cultural ecology approaches in Texas. However, at least one exception is Ellis et al.’s (1995) use of an ecological model to challenge the commonly held notion that Central Texas constitutes both a geographic and prehistoric cultural region. Central Texas, covering approximately 97,400 square kilometers (14 percent of the state), constitutes more than half of the area defined within the boundaries of Johnson’s Classic Toyah Area. Most of this area lies on the Edwards Plateau, which occupies 72

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a pivotal position in the region, centered between several vegetation (Plains Grassland, Plains Grassland and Temperate Forest, Warm Temperate Grassland, Chihuahuan Desert Scrub, and Tamaulipan Thornscrub) and biotic zones (Austroparian, Chihuahuan, Kansan, Tamaulipan, Texan). These zones represent a wealth of plant and animal resources and one of the highest densities, if not the highest density, of white-tailed deer in the United States (Rue 1978). The Edwards Plateau, composed primarily of Lower Cretaceous limestone, is also “one of the largest sources of chert in the United States” (Banks 1990: 59). The Central Mineral Region (or Llano Uplift), located in the northeastern portion of the Plateau, also possesses serpentine, soapstone, and granites used prehistorically to manufacture grinding, mulling, and hammer stones (Turner and Hester 1993: 16). In addition, several large rivers rise in the western and central portions, and abundant springs and creeks are found throughout, with springs concentrated along the Plateau’s eastern and southern boundaries marked by the Balcones Escarpment (Brune 1981). According to Ellis et al., the term “‘Central Texas’ obscures far too much environmental diversity to be useful as a spatial concept around which to build our knowledge of prehistory” (1995: 401). Ellis et al. (1995) used a primary production model (PP) based on effective precipitation and solar radiation computed from evapotranspiration values to refer to annual net above-ground plant production. However, instead of attempting to predict hunter-gatherer behavior, Ellis et al. (1995) focused on using PP to demonstrate environmental diversity and, by extension, the potential for variation on the Edwards Plateau and within the Central Texas area. Based on these data, Ellis et al. described six natural vegetative regions in the “Central Texas archeological region” that can be divided into “subregions representing varying, distinctive vegetative patterns that occur within the larger associated plant community” (Ellis et al. 1995: 404). Using a combination of mean annual precipitation and primary above-ground productivity for Central Texas, they also demonstrated that even uniform changes in the overall east-to-west precipitation gradient throughout this area would result in significant and non-uniform changes to the plant resources in various regions and subregions throughout the “Central Texas archeological region.” For example, relatively dry conditions over the course of a year could result in resource failure in western portions of the area while eastern portions remained relatively unaffected. But the primary purpose of this study was to emphasize the issues associated with imposing archaeological regions on environmentally diverse regions and subregions without considering archaeological and environmental contexts. 73

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In fact, in 2004, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) completed an assessment and compilation of the type, quality, and quantity of environmental resources in Texas. This study was designed to produce a “spatial framework for the research, assessment, management, and monitoring of ecosystems and ecosystem components” that are “critical for structuring and implementing ecosystem management strategies” (Griffith et al. 2004). The EPA defined twelve large ecoregions (Level III), each containing more than fifty smaller ecoregions (Level IV) “identified through the analysis of the spatial patterns of biotic and abiotic phenomena, including geology, physiography, vegetation, climate, soils, land use, wildlife, and hydrology” (Griffith et al. 2004). The Classic Toyah Area alone encompasses seven of the twelve Level III ecoregions for the state and includes sixteen different Level IV ecoregions (Griffith et al. 2004). When the Shared Toyah Area is included, more than a dozen ecoregions can be added. Clearly, far greater environmental diversity existed within the greater Toyah region than most archaeologists have incorporated into cultural ecology models. Moreover, if federal, state, and local agencies find such detailed constructs useful for researching, assessing, managing, and monitoring ecosystems, it seems likely that they would also be useful to archaeologists studying forager ecology and social interaction. In short, the concentrated diversity of topography, animals, minerals, and vegetables found in Central Texas, combined with variable weather patterns, presents an attractive, but capricious, environmental setting. Adapting to such an environment would almost certainly require a number of “back-up” practices (such as scheduling, mobility, social networks) in order to successfully manage different resource crises at different times and of varying magnitudes (Ellis et al. 1995: 409). Based on these environmental data, as well as ethnographic data from people living in similar regions, it seems likely that subsistence was generally characterized by broad-spectrum foraging adapted to specific ecological niches with some specialization occurring seasonally and/or erratically as resources became available. Therefore, it seems prudent for archaeologists, particularly advocates of cultural ecology, to focus on environmental and cultural variation rather than broadly essentializing people, plants, and animals at a regional scale. But, hardly any substantive report or article concerning Toyah published since the 1970s fails to mention the happy coincidence of environmental change, the return of large numbers of bison throughout Texas, and Toyah material culture (Black 1986, Collins 1995, Creel 1991, Dillehay 1974, Johnson 1994, Karbula 2003, Mallouf 1987, Prewitt 1981). Thus, implicitly or explicitly, 74

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correlations are drawn between bison and Toyah artifacts—in short, between environment and material culture and, by extension, between environment and behavior. This implication has resulted in the conclusion that all Toyah people were not simply hunter-gatherers but bison hunters. There is no question that bison were present in both Central and South Texas, perhaps due to changes in environmental conditions, and that Toyah people and bison may have been present simultaneously at some places during the Toyah Interval. Bison bone occurs in many archaeological sites dating to this period (41KM16, 41LK201, 41MN33, 41RF21), and various early historical accounts also document Native Americans hunting bison (Alonso de León Expedition, 1689; Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, 1528–1536; BosqueLarios Expedition, 1675; Castillo-Martín Expedition, 1650; Guadalajara Expedition, 1654; Mendoza-Lopez Expedition, 1683–1684; Henri Joutel, 1687; Fray Juan de Salas, 1629; and Terán Expedition, 1691–1692). But bison are not present in all Toyah sites and are conspicuously sparse in some large campsites (41HM51, 41JW8, 41LK201, 41TV441) (Black 1986). Thus, bison were apparently not found everywhere. Moreover, the suitability of this region in terms of bison habitat has never been tested. For example, the Mendoza-López Expedition traveled for days across the Marfa Plain and Stockton Plateau before crossing the Pecos and sighting bison (Wade 2003). Robert Mallouf (personal communication 2006) states that bison have not been observed with any frequency in sites dating to the very Late Prehistoric Period west of the Pecos River. Thus, it is unclear where, in what numbers, and with what frequency bison ranged in Texas (Dickens and Wiederhold 2003). However, given the environmental diversity, as well as seasonal and annual variability in Central and South Texas, it seems unlikely that most groups relied heavily on bison throughout the year. According to Bamforth, variation in bison adaptations is tied strongly to three climatic variables that measure total forage production, year-to-year variability in annual precipitation, and the proportion of warm season grasses in a region (Bamforth 1988: 98). These climatic variables dictate various permutations of bison behavior, including population, herd sizes, mobility, and the similarity of movements from year to year (see Bamforth 1988: 98, 99). Thus, these same variables can be combined to form an index to predict where bison will occur in large numbers (Bamforth 1988: 99). In terms of Toyah subsistence, Bamforth’s ecological model marks a significant step because it directly addresses the question: Where do bison occur in large numbers? This model may also prove promising in reconstructing bison habitats on a very small scale. Texas climatic data from several locations in each county covering the last half of the twentieth century is now available 75

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and representing rather precise measurements for areas no larger than a few hundred or a thousand square kilometers. This is comparable in size to community territories documented in many ethnographic studies. Thus, combining data from several areas may indicate the corridors in which bison and people moved and interacted. If nothing else, data from Bamforth’s model could be combined with existing paleoenvironmental data to form more precise environmental reconstructions. However, despite its potential and the fact that Bamforth introduced his climate index in the 1980s, this model has never been used to evaluate bison habitat in Texas. Cultural ecology possesses significant potential for contributing to our understanding of Texas prehistory, but it is often undermined by simplistic models that essentialize variation. Nevertheless, a critical review of Toyah studies and cultural ecology approaches suggests two significant implications: 1) bison may not have been abundant in all portions of the Toyah region throughout the year, and 2) bison may not necessarily have been the primary prey throughout the region during most seasons. Thus, the premise that Toyah peoples were specialized bison hunters focused on widespread and abundant bison across the region may be only partly applicable. Another rather obvious implication is that the Toyah lithic assemblage may not represent a specific adaptation to bison. Although frequently linked to bison procurement and processing (Creel 1991, Hester 1995, Prewitt 1981, Quigg 1997, Ricklis 1992), the Toyah lithic assemblage is an extremely functional tool kit suitable for a wide variety of applications. All Toyah tools (Perdiz points, various scrapers, beveled knives, perforators, and utilized flakes) were made using an efficient and expedient flake technology (also documented in preceding Late Archaic and early Late Prehistoric Periods), and all were suitable for procuring and processing a number of game animals (small, medium, and large), as well as some plants. The same may also be said for the Toyah ceramic assemblage, characterized primarily by small deep bowls or shallow jars. Although some (Quigg 1997) have suggested these vessels were used for rendering fat, a specific purpose or use for this ceramic assemblage among Toyah hunter-gatherers remains unclear. In addition to Johnson’s (1994) characterization of Toyah bonetempered ceramics as “regional,” based on variation in their overall form, there is also significant, but rarely discussed, variation in the quality of Toyah ceramics. Some appear to be exceptionally well made in terms of the symmetry, color, quality of paste, consistent size of aplastics (temper), and burnished or floated surface finishes. Other Toyah ceramics appear to be particularly coarse or rough with respect to all of the above attributes. 76

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Efforts to explain this variation are also compounded by the fact that whole vessels are rarely found and, thus, most observations and conclusions must be drawn from sherds. Although some suggest that coarser sherds represent the bottoms of cooking vessels, it is possible that the Toyah ceramic assemblage may contain both utilitarian and prestige wares. Confirmation of the existence of various wares would also suggest far greater complexity in terms of social and subsistence practices than simply the rendering of bison fat. However, this too remains to be tested. Perhaps the only consistency in Toyah plain wares is the inclusion of bone temper and this too is somewhat puzzling. Although bone-tempered ceramics do occur in some sites surrounding the general Toyah culture area, they are not particularly common. As Johnson (1994) pointed out, it also seems unlikely that fresh or “green” bone was used as an aplastic tempering agent. If this was the case, it would have been necessary to dry, perhaps even burn, the bone in order to make it more rigid. Furthermore, from a strictly utilitarian perspective, why would Toyah peoples adopt ceramics when subsistence practices had not changed appreciably and lighter, more portable types of vessels had been in use for perhaps thousands of years? Neighboring groups (Puebloan and Caddo peoples), with whom Toyah peoples interacted, used ceramics for hundreds of years prior to their adoption by Toyah hunter-gatherers. In other times and places around the world, changes in specific forms of material culture, particularly ceramics, often coincide with the adoption of specific types of practices from neighboring groups related to status, religion, etc. For example, Woolf (1998) notes that following the Roman conquest in areas of northern Europe, ceramic vessels related to storing and serving wine began to appear in residences of local elites. The presence of these vessels in areas where beer and mead were once the drinks of choice suggests that local elites purposefully assumed some aspects of Roman identity. Whether this was for their own enjoyment or to gain prestige among Roman elites and/or local peoples is unclear. Inca imperial expansion in Andean South America is also frequently evidenced by Inca ceramics in local elite residences. In some cases, the vessels (aryballos and keru) represented by these ceramics are directly associated with storing and serving chicha (corn beer), which was also consumed during state-sponsored political and religious ceremonies and feasts (Morris and Thompson 1985). Although these instances mark changes in ceramic vessels and practices rather than the specific adoption of a ceramic tradition, they provide some insight into the reasons for change. Moreover, there is nothing in the Roman 77

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and Inca examples to suggest that the adoption of ceramic vessels and practices associated with alcohol consumption were due to changes in climate, the presence or absence of large game, or the migration of peoples. Instead, change appears to be rooted in interaction and the adoption of specific aspects of identity in order to achieve specific objectives. The sudden onset of bone-tempered ceramic production across the region seems unlikely among small groups of mobile hunter-gatherers. Nevertheless, it does present a very specific set of practices associated with a particular artifact type, and the examples above indicate that this may occur for entirely non-subsistence-related reasons. Therefore, it is possible that the origin of Toyah ceramics was tied to rituals or practices among other neighboring groups (ostensibly those that possessed ceramic traditions). In fact, among the Late Prehistoric and early Historic peoples of the American Southeast, including the Caddo, a beverage known as the “black drink” (called “asi” among the Caddo) was made from the leaves and twigs of the Yaupon holly (Ilex vomitoria). This drink contained significant amounts of caffeine and was often consumed at meetings until vomiting occurred. Precisely when this drink gained popularity in the Southeast is unknown, but the range of Yaupon holly extends into Central Texas. Ceramics may not have been necessary for the production or consumption of asi; however, neither are finely crafted tea sets used to serve tea today. Perhaps residue analysis of Toyah and Caddo ceramics will one day reveal significant amounts of caffeine. As a purely speculative aside, it is also interesting to note the general paucity of Toyah cemeteries, as well as individual burials, in the archaeological record of the region. However, Late Archaic and Late Prehistoric I group and individual internments in Central Texas are often characterized by rock cairns and crevice burials on or in ridgelines and on bluffs, particularly along rivers. Cairn burials often consist of little more than stacked stones with a few pieces of charred bone and some lithic tools (generally, a biface such as a knife and/or a projectile point). Only two Toyah period burial sites, Las Haciendas and Rough Run, consistent with these earlier period cairn burials have been reported (Cloud 2002, Mallouf 1987). One was found in Big Bend and the other in Chihuahua, Mexico, just across the border from La Junta de los Rios, and each contained dozens of Perdiz points, indicating high-status individuals (Cloud 2002, Mallouf 1987). Although these, ostensibly, high-status individual internments suggest at least some continuity with earlier burial traditions, they do not explain how most Toyah peoples disposed of their dead. 78

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Moreover, foragers in this region existed for hundreds of years with no pottery while neighboring peoples produced and used ceramic vessels. In the absence of any known Toyah cemeteries and very few individual internments, one possible explanation is that Toyah peoples may have incorporated their ancestors and loved ones into ceramics as bone temper. Forms of internment vary tremendously among peoples around the world, but many cultures incorporate some aspect, sometimes even a physical aspect, of their departed family, friends, and even enemies into their daily lives. Some Puebloan groups, for example, interred their dead immediately below house floors. Nevertheless, it remains unclear why foragers suddenly adopted a labor-intensive, bone-tempered ceramic tradition at about the same time that burial practices faded from the archaeological record. However, it is clear that, despite the ebb and flow of bison across the region through the millennia, broad-spectrum foraging remained a staple subsistence practice for thousands of years preceding Toyah (Collins 1995, Hester 1995, Prewitt 1981, Quigg et al. 2008). That it was the subsistence practice of choice for so long suggests that broad-spectrum foraging was the most efficient, stable, and viable mode of subsistence for the region as a whole. The duration of this tradition emphasizes a significant, if seldom stated, point concerning Texas prehistory. Although some (Gunn and Prewitt 1983) have argued that environmental instability is “clearly a major factor in culture change,” variable environmental regions may also foster and sustain cultural persistence. One cannot simply dismiss the concept that bison may have played a significant role in subsistence strategies. But it remains to be proven that bison hunting, rather than broad-spectrum foraging, was the rule throughout the region. It seems more likely that most Toyah peoples were broad-spectrum foragers engaged in opportunistic bison hunting. Similarly, Toyah lithic and ceramic assemblages may simply evidence increasingly sophisticated developments in broad-spectrum foraging adaptations rather than specific adaptations or innovations to bison hunting. Fortunately, some (Dickens and Wiederhold 2003, Ellis et al. 1995, Hall 1998, Hester 1981, Mehalchik et al. 2004, Thoms 1989) have begun to investigate models of hunter-gatherer behavior based on environmental and ethnographic data, as well as archaeological theory. But archaeologists, particularly cultural ecologists, still have many opportunities to recast the environment and human ecological adaptations in terms of variation and complexity. Clearly, this region was far more complex and diverse than current Toyah and most cultural ecology models suggest. One Toyah model views the lithic 79

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assemblage as evidence for technology transmission among groups and the other sees Toyah as the migration of a single group. In fact, both models rely on social interaction and identity at multiple scales for the transmission of culture. However, neither model specifically addresses identity, interaction, diversity, and regional integration. It is apparent that the Toyah archaeological phenomenon represents something cultural. The question is, what?

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h I s to r I C a L Co n t e x t Conceptualizing Historical Frames of Reference

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he previous chapters introduced Toyah material culture and current archaeological models of Toyah, as well as ethnographic and environmental data, in order to develop a framework or model for prehistoric hunter-gatherer identity and social interaction in Central and South Texas. This model emphasizes three basic scales of huntergatherer identity: 1) the community or band composed of multiple nuclear families inhabiting more or less fixed ranges (i.e., territories); 2) the social aggregate or marriage/linguistic group composed of several intermarried communities occupying comparatively larger geographic areas for longer periods of time—perhaps several generations; and 3) the social field, which integrates numerous communities and marriage groups through long- distance networks that span whole regions and may endure for hundreds of years. If these identities and interactions existed during prehistory, it is reasonable to infer that some survived into the early Historic Period. This chapter focuses on the documentary evidence (its character and interpretation), the impact of European contact, and the evidence for multi-dimensional indigenous identities and interaction.

the doCUmentary evIdenCe: methodoLogy and soUrCes Documentary evidence, derived from translations and transcriptions of Spanish and, to a lesser extent, French primary sources written during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, provides a historical context for the model outlined above. Methodologically, researchers handle primary historical sources by first locating and verifying an original document—which, in this case, could be in any of several countries in North America and Europe— then painstakingly reading, cataloging, transcribing, and translating it

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(Barber and Berdan 1998, Sturtevant 1966, Trigger 1986, Washburn 1961). Researchers must also be aware of their own biases, as well as those within the document, those of the document’s author, and the additional biases that resulted in the survival of the document being investigated. Researchers must also be familiar with the period of study—in this case, Spanish colonial Texas—and the various regions in Europe and the New World from which the documents, authors, and participants came in order to contextualize the chronicle and chronicler. Scholarly translations require an enormous investment of resources that may reflect nothing so much as an interpretation of the original words accompanied by all the biases of everyone involved in its production and translation (Kenmotsu and Wade 2002: 12). Most of these data are derived from translations of primary documents. This is admittedly not the “best” way to gather ethnohistorical data, but this author is no ethnohistorian and it seems appropriate to leave translation to professionals. What follows is a synthesis of regional primary historical documents evaluated by ethnohistorians, historians, and linguists (Craddock 1999, Flint and Flint 2005, Kenmotsu and Wade 2002, Imhoff 2002, Wade 2003). Perhaps the best methodological examples of these works are publications containing verified source documents, facsimile reproductions of original manuscripts, “paleographically exact transcriptions of the textual witnesses” (Craddock 1999: 3), and comparisons between various sources “collated with rigorous philological scrutiny” (Imhoff 2002: 1). These types of publications explain, sometimes in excruciating detail, how various copies of a document came to be and which copies may be closest to the original. Such work is generally accompanied by a facsimile of the original with a transcription in Spanish on the facing page, attendant paleographic notes, and at least some translation of the document (Craddock 1999, Imhoff 2002). This type of publication permits scholars to see the original manuscript and judge for themselves the accuracy of the transcription and, if present, the translation. The William P. Clements Center for Southwest Studies (Southern Methodist University) and the Cíbola Project (through the Research Center for Romance Studies, University of California, Berkeley) have recently published several of these types of documents. In addition, historians and anthropologists in Texas (Foster 1998, Kenmotsu 2001, Kenmotsu and Wade 2002, Wade 2001, 2003) have begun to revisit sixteenth- and seventeenthcentury Spanish and French documents, resulting in new interpretations and, in some cases, the discovery of previously unknown copies of manuscripts (Wade 2003). When combined, these data represent significant contributions to documentary studies in Texas. Documentary sources are, perhaps, most helpful when several different 82

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accounts, focusing on the same or adjacent areas at different spatial and temporal scales, can be examined and compared simultaneously. Combined, these types of documents often draw attention to subtle differences and details of identity and interaction. For example, the Coronado Expedition represented a large, well-equipped army primarily concerned with discovering and conquering large sedentary populations possessing material wealth similar to that found in Mexico and Peru. Cabeza de Vaca’s party, in contrast, consisted of four men shipwrecked on a foreign and hostile coast and forced to rely on their wits and the mercy of the indigenous peoples they encountered. Not surprisingly, these earliest descriptions of Native Americans in Texas (ca. A.D. 1528–1540) reflect two very different perspectives in terms of size, circumstance, training, experience, and motive. Moreover, the vastly different situations in which early European chroniclers found themselves also undoubtedly influenced how they described Native Americans. For example, it is likely that the number of persons in the Coronado Expedition often exceeded the population of many Native American communities they encountered. This was almost certainly true among the hunter-gatherers of the sparsely populated Southern Plains. Thus, the very size of such an expedition could have intimidated a band of foragers, resulting in an implicit coercive advantage. Nor did the size and power of large expeditions go unexercised. The chronicles of the Coronado Expedition contain several accounts in which indigenous peoples, primarily sedentary agricultural groups, were threatened and abused. One reason agriculturalists drew such unsolicited attention was the Spanish desire to extract wealth to pay for ever-greater imperial expansion. Large sedentary agricultural populations represented concentrations of labor and food. Alternatively, a small band of foragers could not support a visiting group of several hundred people and livestock. Mobile hunter-gatherers, unlike agriculturalists, could also simply move elsewhere if the immediate setting was not to their liking. There is also little documentary evidence that large Spanish expeditions were interested in small hunter-gatherer bands beyond obtaining local intelligence and directions. The Coronado Expedition was generally billeted in Native American pueblos at the disposition and great expense of the inhabitants. Thus, contact with hunter-gatherers was limited to brief forays onto the Plains, and even here, descriptions of forager groups were cursory (i.e., small nomadic bands, living in tents, using dogs as pack animals, and almost entirely dependent on bison). Only two groups, distinguished almost entirely on the basis of language and body adornment, are mentioned for the entire Texas 83

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Panhandle. Even the names that the Spanish recorded for these groups are questionable in that at least some appear to be Puebloan terms for linguistic groups, rather than the self-ascribed names of individual bands or cultural groups (Harrington 1940: 512). Cabeza de Vaca’s La Relación, however, documents an entirely different situation. According to this account, a very small group was forced to deal with virtually every aspect of daily practice from the perspective of Native American lifeways. Cabeza de Vaca and his companions were initially held as slaves for several months by various bands of hunter-gatherers, none larger than a few families. Thus, in terms of coercive power, the advantage was firmly in the hands of Native Americans. At least initially the size and circumstances of this group of castaways negated their ability to dictate the terms of social interaction. Even after they escaped and assumed the identity of traders and healers, their survival depended on an intimate knowledge of indigenous social, political, and economic practices. Unlike larger expeditions, Cabeza de Vaca’s party was constantly in direct contact with local peoples, learning the languages of, traveling with, and living among forager bands. Thus, his account reflects detailed descriptions of subsistence activities, attire, customs, marriage, trade, and numerous band names. In short, hunter-gatherer identity, daily practice, and interaction at the community level—the very information that was frequently ignored by larger expeditions—can often be found in these types of narratives. Nevertheless, each type of document has distinct advantages and disadvantages for distinguishing interaction and identity at various spatial and temporal scales. For example, Cabeza de Vaca’s account presents an excellent but somewhat myopic perspective of a vast region, including the names of small bands of hunter-gatherers encountered and many instances of daily practice. However, it offers little information concerning larger spheres of interaction, larger social aggregates, or long-distance networks. Alternatively, the Coronado Expedition documented larger interaction spheres and identities, such as alliances or confederacies, listing their names, locations, and affiliations. However, whether these data represent political, social, and/or economic organizations or simply a single marriage, linguistic, and/or cultural group is unclear. Thus, in order to fully understand either type of documentary evidence, it is often necessary to consider both types of documents. Most of the documents reviewed here were recorded more than three hundred years ago. This represents a significant gulf (in time, language, environment, culture, and experience) between these documents and more recent (within the last ten years) translations. Simply put, these accounts were 84

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written from a sixteenth- and seventeenth-century European perspective for a sixteenth- and seventeenth-century European audience. One may well question the ability of current researchers to adequately comprehend, much less convey, the meaning and intent of these documents. However, early in the twentieth century, a group of historians and linguists (i.e., Herbert E. Bolton, Charles W. Hackett, Mattie Austin Hatcher, and Frederick W. Hodge) transcribed and translated several original documents archived in Mexico (Kenmotsu, personal communication 2006). Although some may argue that early translations and interpretations lack the methodological sophistication of today’s researchers, a critical examination of daily life in Texas from A.D. 1700 to 1900 suggests that early twentiethcentury researchers may have had more in common with Spanish colonial peoples than with contemporary researchers. For example, researchers at the turn of the last century would have traveled routes across a landscape that was not entirely dissimilar to the early Historic Period, particularly when compared to present-day conditions. Few large rivers in this region were either bridged or dammed prior to World War II, the coastline was relatively unaltered, and many biotic communities retained a more indigenous character than today. In addition, the experiential base of these early historical researchers was more akin, in many ways, to that of Spanish colonial Texas and Mexico than to our own world of interstate highways, reservoirs, hectares of monocrop agriculture, and instantaneous communication. Historians working during the early twentieth century were born into a world in which the horse still provided the most immediate, the fastest, and the most reliable transportation for many people, and rural and urban development was minimal by comparison to today’s standards. Perhaps nowhere is this continuity more evident than in terms of daily practice. People probably put their pants on one leg at a time, but they did not use zippers until the late 1930s. In 1935, only 2.3 percent of farms and ranches in Texas had electricity, and indoor plumbing was still considered a luxury for many Texans at the turn of the twentieth century. Clearly, there was some continuity through the commonality of experience (daily practice) between Spanish colonial people and these early twentieth-century researchers. Therefore, we should not be too quick to dismiss their abilities to reckon the words and intents of early chroniclers. A somewhat related issue is the dichotomy between prehistoric (homogeneity) and historic (heterogeneity) interpretations of this region. The fact that these two periods of time have traditionally been researched by different academic fields (history vs. anthropology) and treated as two different sub85

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jects (history vs. archaeology) almost certainly contributed to divisive interpretations and a lack of continuity in Native American prehistory and history as it has elsewhere (Lightfoot et al. 1998). It is also equally unlikely that the diversity and complexity of Native American identity and interaction simply ended or began immediately before or after Europeans arrived. Spanish and French documents written between the mid-sixteenth century and the beginning of the eighteenth century provide remarkably consistent descriptions of who Native American peoples interacted with and how (e.g., hunting parties, political alliances, long- distance trade). In particular, a large regional Native American alliance referred to as “Tejas,” or the “Tejas Alliance,” involving dozens of indigenous groups was noted for approximately 150 years. Although some may argue that this alliance was merely in reaction to or resulted from European expansion into the region, ethnographic and environmental data indicate that such alliances were commonplace, particularly among hunter-gatherers in environmentally variable regions. Few would question that significant change occurred for everyone in this region when Europeans arrived. But change, rather than stasis, is the norm, and continuity between these periods is seldom acknowledged. The purely academic division between prehistoric and historic peoples also tends to emphasize the character, degree, and rate of change while deemphasizing the resourceful, adaptable, and persistent continuity of Native American identity and interaction.

the earLy hIstorIC PerIod: eUroPean ImPaCts and natIve amerICan resPonses Some archaeologists and historians refer to the dawn of European exploration in Texas as the “Protohistoric Period.” Although few documentary records exist and archaeological sites evidencing both European and indigenous material culture are rare, European-Native American contact was thought to have occurred in this period (Adkins and Adkins 1982: 242). This concept first became popular among Plains archaeologists for regions that contained archaeological sites with both European and Native American artifacts, but where contact was thought to be so minimal that it had yet to affect the indigenous economy (Baugh 1986: 183). Several years ago, Hester (1995: 450) suggested a similar situation in South Texas: “This is exactly what we have in South Texas in the 16th and 17th centuries, before the Spanish explorers 86

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and mission system ‘impacted the economy’ of indigenous groups” (Hester 1995: 450). Today, it is relatively common to hear archaeologists use the term “protohistoric” when discussing the early portion of the Historic Period in Texas (Boyd 1997, Collins 1995). Although the early Historic and Protohistoric Periods generally refer to a specific time from A.D. 1530 to 1650–1700, the term “protohistoric” is intended to imply that Europeans were present in Texas, but only indirectly involved in the lives of most Native Americans. In fact, beyond the walls of missions and presidios, indigenous archaeological sites dating to this period and containing historic artifacts are extremely rare, representing less than 1 percent of all archaeological sites in Texas. Thus, the concept of the Protohistoric Period in Texas as a time when Europeans had little impact on Native American populations is based primarily on the fact that European artifacts are rarely found in Native American sites of this time period. However, the documentary evidence suggests that the absence of European material culture in this region is not due to the absence of European activity, but rather to a combination of the extractive nature of Spanish imperial policies and a general scarcity of European manufactured goods in this region at this time. Also, the time span under consideration is only about 175 years, a very short time indeed for a very limited amount of European artifacts to be deposited in sufficient quantities to be archaeologically detectable over a region roughly the size of Spain and France combined. Finally, the documentary evidence clearly indicates that Europeans were making their presence felt across the American Southwest prior to A.D. 1600. Although it is difficult to detect the precise impact of European contact, it is clear from a number of accounts (Benavides, Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, Castaño de Sosa, Castañeda de Nájera, Coronado, de Soto, Espejo, Jaramillo, Leyva de Bonilla and Humaña, Luxán, Morlete, Oñate, Pichardo, Chamuscado and Rodríguez, and Zaldívar) that Spanish traders, soldiers, and missionaries had contact with dozens of Native Americans groups in Texas prior to A.D. 1650. The character of this contact varied, but, prior to A.D. 1550, at least two large, well-armed expeditions (Coronado and de Soto/ Moscoso), containing hundreds of personnel and herds of European livestock (i.e., horses, mules, cattle, sheep, and pigs), as well as very small parties, consisting of as few as four individuals (i.e., Cabeza de Vaca’s group), had entered Texas from the south, west, and east and, in some cases, had traversed large portions of the state. It is difficult to imagine that these early entradas, particularly the larger 87

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ones, did not have some impact on local peoples. The Coronado and de Soto/Moscoso expeditions spent years in the interior of North America. During that time, they either fought or allied themselves with dozens of Native American groups, all the while introducing European technology, diseases, and economic systems. The Spanish sought the same wealth their European counterparts had discovered in Mexico and Peru. However, the Native Americans they encountered were not economically or politically unsophisticated, and once the intent of the conquistadores was evident, the indigenous communities worked to rid themselves of these unwanted guests. In some cases, these communities allied themselves with other groups in order to battle the Spanish. In other cases, they simply directed the conquistadores elsewhere, thereby passing the intruders off to another community or cultural group. However, these actions were not without consequences. Resistance to large Spanish expeditionary forces inevitably led to violence and severe punishment by the Spanish (Flint and Flint 2005). In some cases, whole communities were destroyed or displaced, as was the case during the occupation of Tiquex (a Puebloan town in what is today New Mexico) by the Coronado Expedition (Castañeda de Nájera in Flint and Flint 2005: 402–403). But compliance also had negative implications. Spanish forces often requisitioned food, supplies, and even entire pueblos to billet troops, forcing the inhabitants elsewhere and ultimately straining the resources of adjacent communities and social aggregates throughout the region (Castañeda de Nájera in Flint and Flint 2005: 400). In the face of such overwhelming odds, old relationships and networks crumbled and new ones rose in their place. Direct contact resulted in a ripple effect throughout the entire region as Native Americans who had never seen the Spanish were, nevertheless, forced to respond to the indirect, but equally profound, effects of these entradas. Thus, large areas containing many communities formed over generations began to change as soon as the first Europeans arrived (ca. A.D. 1530–1540). Even exposure to very small European parties may have had a devastating impact on Native American communities. For example, the ill-fated Narvaez Expedition, of which Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca was a member, marooned approximately eighty men on the Texas coast in 1528. All but fifteen perished quickly of exposure and disease and only four (Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, Andrés Dorantes de Carranza, Alonso del Castillo Maldonado, and Esteban) ever reached Mexico City after wandering throughout most of South Texas as well as portions of northern Mexico and the American Southwest. Although it is unclear exactly what caused the deaths of most of Cabeza de Vaca’s co88

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hort, it is perhaps significant that in many of the Native American communities they visited, people were already sick and/or dying. Sickness was so commonplace that Cabeza de Vaca and his companions often earned their way as healers across the American Southwest. It is also likely that they witnessed, and inadvertently introduced, the first pandemic of European diseases into Texas. Ironically, they also introduced the perception among Native Americans that Europeans possessed the power to heal. Thus, those seeking succor for illness or injury may have been exposed to even greater threats. These accounts also reveal that as early as the sixteenth century, Native Americans in what is today the U.S.-Mexico borderlands lived in fear of being enslaved by European raiding parties and sent to work on Spanish ranches, farms, and mines. Cabeza de Vaca noted that many areas were virtually depopulated due to the depredations of slave raiders. In fact, Cabeza de Vaca’s party was finally rescued in 1536 by a group of slavers, and his Native American escort narrowly averted being pressed into perpetual servitude. Thus, fewer than twenty years after Cortez landed on the Mexican mainland, large numbers of indigenous people in northern Mexico had been displaced, enslaved or had died of disease. Hernán Gallegos’s relación of the Chamuscado-Rodríguez Expedition in 1581 notes that it was necessary for the expedition to reassure people living in the vicinity of La Junta de los Rios “in order that they might know that the Spaniards were their friends and would not harm them further or steal any more of their people” (Hammond and Rey 1966: 72). A year later, Luxán reported that the Espejo Expedition was attacked by indigenous peoples (Otomoacos) at La Junta de los Rios (the confluence of the Concho River in Chihuahua, Mexico, and the Rio Grande River in West Texas). The natives believed the expedition had entered the area seeking slaves, and the situation was defused only after some negotiation (Hammond and Rey 1966: 158–160). Fortunately, the expedition interpreter, who had been captured by slave raiders as a boy a few years before, was a native of that same ranchería (generally, a small, seasonal hunter-gatherer residential base or campsite). This account is particularly revealing with respect to the early and pervasive character of Spanish raiding in northern Mexico. In 1581, most Spanish mines were located several hundred kilometers south of the junction of the Rio Grande and Concho Rivers. For example, San José de Parral, or Parral, (located more than 320 kilometers south of La Junta de los Rios), although not established until fifty years after the Espejo Expedition, would eventually become one of the largest silver mines in Mexico ( Jones 2001: 12). These accounts also suggest that by the 1530s the Spanish had already 89

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begun to exhaust locally available indigenous labor and by the late 1500s were raiding areas in West Texas for slaves. Gerhard (1993) presents numerous examples from Nueva Vizcaya, Coahuila, and Texas in which hunter-gatherers living in independent rancherías, each exploiting well- defined subsistence territories, were forced to work in mines and on encomiendas—a gift of land, and its inhabitants, for service to the crown—hundreds of miles from their homelands. The documentary record of these early and persistent impacts, occurring well beyond the bounds of Spanish settlement, is not particularly well known outside of historical circles. This may be one reason why archaeologists have inferred that, since the Spanish left little in the way of artifacts, they did not have a significant impact. However, with some notable exceptions (discussed below), the Spanish were not coming to Texas to trade with Native Americans during this very early portion of the Historic Period. Instead, their purpose was purely extractive and, thus, they left little behind. The first large, well- organized entradas into this region were conducted specifically to locate and extract riches for the Spanish empire. Failing this, the Spanish retreated into northern Mexico, where they intensified their efforts to mine primarily silver using Native American labor ( Jones 2001: 11). Spanish imperial economic and political policies in the American Southwest were grounded in practical experience with numerous Native American peoples elsewhere in the New World. As Gerhard (1993: 169) notes, the political and economic institutions of prehistoric Mesoamerica (including central Mexico) “could, with only slight modification, be adapted to suit the needs of the Spaniards, but the people of the north were quite unable to fit this mold.” The highly mobile hunter-gatherers of northern Mexico and Texas did not live in concentrated sedentary populations and were neither farmers nor particularly rich in terms of material wealth. However, one exception in this region was the “kingdom” of Nuevo Mexico founded in 1598 (Gerhard 1993: 313). Here, large dense populations of sedentary agriculturalists with well-developed textile and ceramic traditions presented a concentrated and exploitable skilled labor pool. Eventually, however, a combination of greed, poor leadership, rampant corruption by the Spanish, as well as their outright cruelty to the indigenous peoples of New Mexico, resulted in the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. In fact, the Spanish made several expeditions into Texas from New Mexico prior to the Pueblo Revolt. These visits were prompted by one Native American group in particular, the Jumano, who lived hundreds of miles to the southeast in what is today the northwest Edwards Plateau of Central 90

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Texas. In Benavides Memorial of 1630 and again in Fray Alonso Benavides’ Revised Memorial of 1634, Benavides stated that, during their annual summer visits to trade at the Salinas Pueblos, the Jumano regularly implored Fray Juan de Salas to come to their homeland and baptize them (Forrestal 1954: 57, Hodge et al. 1945: 94). These pleas went unanswered until 1628 when thirty new friars arrived, permitting Salas to accompany the Jumano to their homeland in 1629 (Forrestal 1954, Hodge et al. 1945). Although the precise location of the Jumano homeland is unknown, Spanish documents place it several hundred kilometers southeast of the Salinas Pueblos, approximately in the northwest, north central portion of the Edwards Plateau (in the vicinity of modern-day San Angelo). Salas’s visit was facilitated by the archbishop of Mexico, who ordered the Franciscans to investigate the visions of a young nun, Mother María de Jesus. The nun, residing in Spain, claimed the miraculous gift of bi-location in which she was able to preach the Catholic faith to “savage Indians” located somewhere between New Mexico and Quivira (Hodge et al. 1945: 93). According to Benavides and several other Franciscans, the Jumano stated that they were often visited by a young nun in blue garb, who told them to seek baptism and the Catholic faith from the friars (Forrestal 1954, Hodge et al. 1945). Regardless of whether one chooses to believe or disbelieve in bi-location and the “Miraculous Conversion of the Xumana Nation,” the resulting contact between the Spanish and Jumano (ca. 1629 and 1679) represents some of the most sustained contact between Europeans and indigenous peoples in the Texas interior during this period. In 1629, Father Juan de Salas journeyed east more than 415 kilometers (260 miles) to visit the Jumano and returned in 1632 with a group of Spanish soldiers and another friar, Diego Ortega. Although Fr. Salas returned after a short time to San Antonio de Isleta (just south of the present city of Albuquerque), Fr. Diego Ortega stayed with the soldiers in the Jumano lands for more than six months (Kenmotsu 2001: 28, Wade 2003: 72). At least two military expeditions followed. One in 1650, led by Sergeant Major Diego del Castillo and Captain Hernán Martín, and another in 1654, led by Sergeant Major Diego de Guadalajara, also went to the Jumano lands and penetrated deep into the Texas interior (Hickerson 1994: 110–111, Kenmotsu 2001: 28–29, Wade 2003: 74). The first expedition found enormous herds of bison and freshwater pearls along what is believed to be the Concho River above its junction with the Colorado River. During this expedition, the Jumano also informed the Spanish that beyond the lands of three other 91

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groups (Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado) were the Tejas, a very large and populous nation of agriculturalists (Wade 2003: 74). The Castillo-Martín Expedition returned to New Mexico with bison hides and pearls and tales of rich lands to the east. During the second expedition in 1654, the Spanish intended to meet the Tejas, but the Jumano indicated they could not due to conflict with the Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado. The Spanish then allied themselves with the Jumano and engaged the Cuitoa in warfare. Two hundred prisoners and numerous bundles of furs (bison, deer, and antelope) were captured by the Spanish and Jumano, but they were forced to retreat when they received word that the Excanxaque were in route to aid the Cuitoa (Wade 2003: 74). These accounts give some indication of the extent and character of Jumano social interaction as well as cultural identity. Not only did the Jumano trade regularly with the Pueblos of New Mexico, they also interacted with groups as far away as East Texas. Furthermore, the numerous furs captured from the Cuitoa and the references to bison indicate extensive interaction and a thriving fur trade across portions of this region during the early Historic Period. Despite these extensive ties, Jumano interaction with other groups was interrupted from time to time by various factions (e.g., Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado). Although the size of these groups and the precise nature of the relationship among the Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado is unclear (e.g., language, marriage, political alliance), the number of Cuitoa prisoners alone suggests some sort of social aggregate larger than a single community. These accounts clearly show that the Spanish were focused on extracting resources from the hinterlands of the empire. There is also little doubt that the isolation and difficulty of life in the New Mexico colony contributed to this process (Gerhard 1993: 316). Soldiers and colonists recognized the value of dressed hides and pearls, and the possibility of meeting the Tejas, a large sedentary population of agriculturalists living in a fertile region, must have been an enormous draw. Therefore, in addition to religious motives, it is likely these expeditions were also driven by economic objectives. Later documentary evidence also indicates that these visits were more frequent than earlier accounts suggest. Following the Pueblo Revolt, the surviving colonists retreated to El Paso del Rio del Norte (El Paso) where they faced further deprivations, primarily from overcrowding and hunger, as they huddled together for safety on the edge of the Spanish empire. It was here in August 1683 that a delegation of twelve Jumano Indians, each captains of rancherías and led by Juan Sabeata (also a Jumano captain), delivered a declaration to Don Antonio de Otermín, governor of New Mexico: 92

hIstorICaL Context [W]e have always had relations of friendship and trade since [the time] of New Mexico [and these contacts between Spaniards and Jumano were conducted] with such security that Spaniards [in groups] of six, eight, and ten went to their rancherías every year to trade with the Indians mentioned. (“Declaration of Juan Sabeata,” 11 August 1683 [Wade 2003: 236])

This account indicates an almost casual familiarity between the Spanish and the Jumano. Frequent interaction with the Spanish almost certainly provided more opportunities for Jumano individuals to obtain greater status and prestige associated with increased economic wealth and military strength. The joint Spanish-Jumano raid on the Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado in 1654 clearly shows that alliances could be mutually beneficial to the victors. It seems likely that Spanish members of these expeditions also benefited from this relationship, both in terms of status and wealth. Frequent Spanish-Jumano interaction afforded numerous possibilities for participants to assume various identities and to negotiate and achieve objectives that would not have been possible within a more circumscribed social setting. These documents also support a model of hunter-gatherer individuals and groups participating in complex and long- distance social interaction within a pluralistic cultural setting. These documents are particularly revealing with respect to the ability of a Native American cultural group to adapt to extremely fluid geopolitical situations. Juan Sabeata’s declaration also states that the Jumano had been told by others that the Spanish were finished. Thus, the purpose of the Jumano visit was twofold: first, to determine if the Spanish survived the revolt and second, to renew their close relationship with the Spanish and to invite them to come to the Jumano lands, which were, at that time, being threatened by Apache (Athapaskan) incursions from the north. It is likely that, prior to their visit to El Paso, the Jumano had assessed the plight of the surviving New Mexico colonists and recognized an opportunity to engineer a series of events that would also benefit Jumano interests. Virtually every Spanish settlement in New Mexico had been lost, and the survivors were desperately overcrowded, underfed, and almost solely dependent on supplies sent from the south. The Jumano, for their part, were hard pressed on their northern and western flanks by the increasingly assertive Athapaskan migration south, which had begun centuries earlier. The Salinas Pueblos, the traditional partners of the Jumano in the west, succumbed to a combination of drought, famine, and Apache attacks during the 1660s and 1670s. The Pueblo Revolt ten years later also meant an end to trade with the 93

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fIgUre 5.1 Approximate locations of Querechos and Teyas recorded by Coronado ca. A.D. 1541 (after Habicht-Mauche 1992: Figure 1).

Spanish, effectively severing Jumano social, economic, and political ties in the west. The enmity between the Jumano and Apache was also well known and possessed significant time depth, with the Coronado Expedition providing perhaps the first account of this long-standing feud (see Flint and Flint 2005 and Polt 1999). After conquering the Puebloan area, Coronado was informed of a populous land possessing gold and agriculture called Quivira, located far to the east across the Plains. It is now clear that this was a ruse by the Puebloan peoples, who were attempting to rid themselves of invaders. The ruse worked to some extent and a large Spanish contingency set out across the Plains. In crossing the grasslands this expedition documented two distinct groups, the Querechos and Teyas, that inhabited the Plains east of the Pecos pueblos as well as the Texas Panhandle and were perpetually at war with each other (Figure 5.1). According to Castañeda de Nájera and Jaramillo (Flint and Flint 2005), both groups lived in tents, used dogs as pack animals, followed and subsisted primarily on bison, and traded bison, antelope, and deer hides with whatever group they happened to encounter, including the New Mexican Pueblos, the Quivirans, and “others towards La Florida” (Flint and Flint 2005: 423). The Coronado chroniclers appear to have been impressed by both the 94

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Querechos and Teyas and, despite the apparent enmity between the two groups, wrote favorably about them: “They do not eat human flesh. They are a kind people and not violent. They hold faithfully to friendship. They are very skillful with signs” (Flint and Flint 2005: 423). Although the Querechos have been confidently identified as Athapaskan speaking Plains Apache (Boyd 1997), the ethnic affiliation of the Teyas, beyond a predilection for painting or tattooing their bodies, remains uncertain (Boyd 2001: 6). But it was among the Teyas that the Spanish found food, shelter, and significant information concerning their ultimate destination, Quivira. It was a small Teya hunting party that found the expedition wandering lost in the vast grasslands of the Llano Estacado. After a four- day journey, the Spanish were led to a large ranchería in a “great barranca [steep-sided gulch or arroyo] like those of Colima” (Flint and Flint 2005: 409). Here, the Spanish learned that some of these people had met Cabeza de Vaca some ten years previously when, as they claimed, many went to harvest prickly pear and yucca. Here too, the Spanish learned they had been duped by the Puebloans concerning the riches of Quivira. The Teyas, echoing another Native American (Ysopete) member of the expedition, also informed the Spanish that their primary guide, the “Turk,” was leading them farther and farther into the Plains. In addition, according to the Teyas, Quivira lay to the north and east, just as Ysopete had also told them. Based on the recovery of Spanish artifacts dating to the Coronado Expedition found in association with several Late Prehistoric II residential base camps, the location of this Teya ranchería is now thought to have been in a large canyon (Blanco Canyon) just east of the Llano Estacado between the Floydada Country Club Site (41FL1) and the Montgomery Site (41FL17) (Figure 5.2). Perhaps the most conclusive archaeological evidence tying this location to the Coronado Expedition was the recovery of distinctive crossbow bolts, which were discontinued by subsequent Spanish expeditions (Blakeslee and Blaine 2003). The Coronado chroniclers indicate that the Querechos and Teyas were large distinct social groups, each composed of many rancherías spread over a wide area. Boyd (1997, 2001) has described both Querechos and Teyas as ethnic groups and linked them to the Late Prehistoric II/Protohistoric Tierra Blanca and Garza Complexes, respectively (Tierra Blanca/Querechos and Garza/Teyas), based primarily on corresponding geographic, ethnohistoric, and archaeological evidence. In fact, the Coronado chroniclers make it clear that they were initially led east onto the Plains, where they met the Querechos, and then in a south-to-southeast direction until they encountered the Teyas (Flint and Flint 2005). Furthermore, some concept of the size of the 95

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fIgUre 5.2 Archaeological sites distinguishing Tierra Blanca/Querechos from Garza/Teyas (after Habicht-Mauche 1992: Figure 2 and Boyd 1997: Figures 98 and 99).

Teyas area, as well as settlement pattern data, is indicated in the following passage from Castañeda de Nájera: From this place some Teyas (which is what those people were called) departed with the expedition and traveled with their droves of dogs and their women and children until the encampment at the end of the last day’s journey, [at a settlement] of other [Teyas]. (Flint and Flint 2005: 410)

The Coronado Expedition accounts suggest the Teyas lived in a large area south of the Querechos. The Teyas consisted of several mobile huntergatherer bands composed of nuclear families that often moved together from one residential base camp to the next and sometimes separated into small special purpose groups, such as hunting parties. In many respects, this resembles the model for hunter-gatherer bands/communities described in the previous chapter. However, the Querechos and Teyas present very similar subsistence and 96

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settlement patterns in adjacent and almost identical environmental settings. According to the Spanish, the two peoples differed only in their dislike for each other and in the Teyas’ custom of tattooing. Linguistic data remain largely unknown. To confuse matters further, the Quivirans were also known to tattoo their faces and bodies and to hunt bison and, according to Castañeda de Nájera, “[t]he people are of nearly the [same] sort and [have nearly the same] dress as the Teyas” (Flint and Flint 2005: 423). But, according to the Puebloans, the Spanish, and the Teyas and Quivirans themselves, the Quivirans and the Teyas were not considered the same because one group practiced agriculture whereas the other hunted, one lived in houses and the other in tents, and they both lived in different geographic areas. Generally, distinguishing one material culture from another is a matter of differentiating artifact classes, decorative motifs, and features related to different stylistic traditions and subsistence and settlement practices. The process of distinguishing material cultures can often be much easier if the preservation is good and the cultures in question exhibit obvious differences (i.e., sedentary agriculturalists and mobile hunters). However, in the case of the Teyas and Querechos, the paucity of durable artifacts and the similarities in settlement and subsistence practices do not provide many clear- cut distinctions between the two. Nevertheless, Boyd (2001) presents archaeological evidence for two distinct archaeological complexes in the Texas Panhandle during the Prehistoric Period immediately preceding the early Historic Period. Although the artifact classes in both complexes’ lithic assemblages are the same (arrow points, beveled knives, and end scrapers), the stylistic attributes of at least one artifact type, arrow points, are not. Boyd (2001: 10) points to the abrupt decline in the frequency of Garza points north of the Colorado and Brazos River drainage systems and their almost complete disappearance north of the Red River drainage as evidence for a distinct ethnic boundary. The Red River drainage also marks the northernmost distribution of Perdiz points, the most common point type found throughout Texas during the Late Prehistoric II Period. In fact, Johnson (1994: 241–287) describes the southern Llano Estacado as a “shared area,” and Boyd (2001: 11) notes that Toyah and Garza Complex occupations are often found side by side with Perdiz and Garza points occurring together at many sites in west Central Texas. Therefore, despite the fact that these point types are found separately as well as together below the Red River drainage in the Llano Estacado they are rarely, if ever, found above it. The combination of archaeological and documentary data provides some evidence that, in this particular context, arrow points mark a cultural 97

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boundary (i.e., multiple cultural identities are visible, but social interaction between them was extremely limited). Coronado’s chroniclers also noted that the Teyas interacted widely with numerous peoples—including sedentary groups, the Puebloans to the west, perhaps the Caddo (this may have been what was meant by “La Florida”) to the east—and even supplied the expedition with guides to Quivira and back to the Pueblos: [The Teyas] provided the [guides] voluntarily. [They knew of a more direct route] because, since they are people who do not stop [permanently] in those lands, [but travel] in pursuit of the [bison] herd, they know everything. (Flint and Flint 2005: 411)

Similar social interaction is evident in the ceramics recovered from large Garza sites, particularly those noted by Boyd (1997: 391–397) in Blanco Canyon (41FL1 and 41FL17). Numerous examples were found there, including Puebloan ceramics (Kotyiti Glaze-yellow [Glaze F], Pueblo IV, Roswell Brown, Jornada Brown, Middle Pecos Micaceous, Late Rio Grande Micaceous, El Paso Brownware, El Paso Polychrome, Lincoln Black-on-red, Gila Polychrome, Three Rivers Red-on-terracotta, Chihuahua Polychrome, Chupadero Black-on-white, Los Lunas smudges, Pecos Glaze II or III, Rio Grande Glaze B or C), Caddoan ceramics (mentioned as Killough Pinched and La Rue Neck Banded types), and even Doss Redware (generally identified with Toyah). Many of these ceramics are also associated with site 41FL17, where Spanish crossbow bolts definitively date the site to the time of the Coronado Expedition. Chroniclers of the expedition also provide some clues to cultural identity by identifying the origin of terms used to describe people. For example, a close read of both the Jaramillo and Castañeda de Nájera documents indicates that the words “Teya” and “Querecho” were not necessarily the names the “Teya” and “Querecho” used for themselves. Jaramillo and Castañeda de Nájera explicitly state that these were terms used by Puebloan peoples (Flint and Flint 2005: 420, 514). In a particularly telling statement, Jaramillo wrote: “[W]e found Indians who were called Querechos by the [Indians] from the flat roofed houses” (Flint and Flint 2005: 514). To the people who lived in the “flat roofed houses,” the term “Querechos” may have meant little more than the people who “live and wander on the plains and are not Teyas.” In fact, peoples are often lumped together under the same moniker. That is, the term “Puebloan” is used in this book in almost the same fashion as Jaramillo used it—to refer to dozens of distinct groups that lived in a particular type of house in a spe98

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cific area. Castañeda de Nájera notes this same tendency in the remark that Puebloan peoples characterized the Teyas as brave people or braves “in the same way the Mexicanos [Nahuas] portray Chichimecas or Tueles” (Flint and Flint 2005: 420). Moreover, the terms “Querechos” and “Teyas” do not appear in any later historical accounts from the Texas Panhandle, suggesting the terms were not self ascribed. In her review of the Coronado Expedition encounter with the Querechos and Teyas, Habicht-Mauche (1992) offers the following explanation for the term “Querecho”: According to Harrington (1940: 512) the Jemez/Towa name for Navajos, and other Athapaskan-speakers in general, is Kearai. Adding the suffix tsa’a for person, the word becomes Kearaitsa’a. (Habicht-Mauche 1992: 254)

However, this author found no evidence for this explanation in Harrington (1940). Instead, Harrington alludes to other linguistic evidence (unfortunately, not cited by him) that the term “Teya” is, in fact, the Pecos/Jemez word for eastern Apache and is not related to the word for “the name of the State of Texas” (1940: 512). Although Harrington does reference the term “t’saa’” in a rather lengthy footnote, he states this term is applied to a specific type of commonly known basket: “These baskets are called t’saa’ in Navajo” (1940: 511). Hickerson (1994), a linguist, also notes the similarity among “Teyas,” “Texia,” and “Tejas.” She points out that the terms “Tejas” and “Texia,” from which “Texas” is derived, appeared to be of Caddoan origin and during the seventeenth century meant “friend” or “ally” (Hickerson 1994: 24). In fact, the word “Caddo” encompasses at least four large social aggregates—the Hasinai and Kadohadocha in Texas, the Natchitoches (Louisiana), and the Cahinnio (Arkansas)—that once consisted of several subdivisions located several hundred miles to the east and southeast of the Texas Panhandle. The Hasinai, Kadohadocha, Natchitoches, and Cahinnio may have been something akin to marriage/linguistic groups that lived in agricultural communities, spoke various dialects of the Caddo language, and also distinguished themselves by tattooing. According to Fray Francisco Casañas de Jesús María (ca. A.D. 1691), one of the first Spanish missionaries to work among the Native Americans of East Texas, the most westerly Caddoan group, the Hasinai, played a significant role in a large alliance that most native peoples in the region referred to as “Tejias” or “Tejas.” Tejas included more than fifty non–Caddoan groups, including the Jumano, who spoke different languages and lived to the north, 99

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east, south, and west of the Hasinai. Henri Joutel (ca. A.D. 1687) also recorded that the Hasinai had approximately fifty allies living in South, Central, and West Texas (Foster 1998: 146–147). He counted the Choumay or Choman, the French spelling for Jumano, among these allies and noted that the Choman were tattooed, traveled and traded frequently, and hunted bison in West Texas. Although the identity of Coronado’s “Teyas” remains unclear, there is little doubt that Querechos, as Apache or Athapaskan invaders, were ill-received by local peoples displaced in their advance. Coronado’s account of the Querechos may represent the first historically documented evidence for the Athapaskan migration into Texas. The Coronado documents also show that the tattooed Teyas were enemies of the Querechos. Tattooing was apparently a common cultural trait among the peoples of West, Central, and East Texas ( Jumano, Caddo, and Teyas). Moreover, tattooing may have identified political or cultural affiliations among related, but widespread, peoples. This practice was also found to the north in Oklahoma and southern Kansas, where Coronado’s expedition eventually located Quivira. The Quivirans, described as tattooed agriculturalists living in hamlets and villages, hunted bison on a seasonal basis. These peoples are now considered to be protohistoric Wichita, whose language is classified as part of the Caddoan language family. It also seems likely that the terms “Querecho” and “Teya” recorded by the Coronado Expedition did not identify a specific cultural group. Instead, the words may have simply been general monikers for several different cultural groups and/or social aggregates. The people identified as “Teyas” may have been the most northwesterly culture group of the Tejas Alliance (perhaps the ancestors of the historic Jumano and/or the descendants of the prehistoric Garza Complex). In a similar manner, the culturally distinct Tigua, Hopi, and Zuni peoples were grouped together as the “people of the flat-roofed houses” by the Coronado Expedition. Thus, the “Querecho” may have simply been a generic catch-all for Athapaskans or Apaches. Regardless of their identity, Coronado’s Teyas apparently occupied a shared area with or were in close proximity to the Jumano, and both were tattooed. Thus, the Puebloans and Querechos may have simply thought of the two as allies and/or as members of the Tejas Alliance. For example, the Coronado Expedition consisted of Spanish, Portuguese, Basque, “African,” and “Indian” slaves, and members of various Mexican groups. All of these terms are ambiguous as to specific identities (e.g., “African” describes an individual from nothing less than a continent), and much more precise subdivi100

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sions certainly existed. Nevertheless, all are subsumed today under the term “Spanish.” Moreover, these examples demonstrate that lumping numerous distinct communities and cultures together under a single moniker was neither uncommon at that time nor limited to Europeans or sedentary agriculturalists. A small collection of Native American words was recorded during the testimony of the Talon brothers, survivors of the La Salle colony, who were taken in as children by the Caddo (Hasinai group) and the Karankawa (Clamcoeh group). The word “yayecha” from this collection refers to a “European, Spaniard or French, without making any distinction” (Bell 1987: 258). This suggests that group names, whether used by Europeans or Native speakers, often provide little or no precise meaning in terms of sociocultural identity. Despite this ambiguity, some things seemed to remain constant over long periods of time in this region. The first is the high degree of regional interaction among various culture groups, the second is the enmity between the Apaches and indigenous Texas groups, and the third is the Native American perspective that the Spanish were not simply an adversary, but might also prove a useful ally. This was clearly evident in 1598 when Apaches on what they called the “Buffalo Plains” attempted to enlist the support of the Zaldívar Expedition against their enemies, the Jumano (Polt 1999: 33). Thus, fifty years after the Coronado Expedition pillaged the Native American Southwest, at least one indigenous group began to entertain the idea of an alliance with the Spanish. It is also interesting to note that in the fifty years prior to the Pueblo Revolt, when the Spanish were regular visitors in the Jumano homeland, there is little or no mention of the Apache in the Jumano area. This suggests that the Spanish provided, however inadvertently, some security during this earlier period of contact. The Jumano were certainly aware of the Spanish military advantage, having witnessed and participated in the dramatic defeat of the Cuitoa in 1654 (Wade 2003: 74). As both Kenmotsu (2001) and Wade (2003) point out, the Jumano were also extremely adept at assessing and manipulating social, economic, and political situations in their favor. For example, in 1683, the Jumano appeared at what must have been a desperate hour for the survivors of the Pueblo Revolt, imploring the Spanish to accompany them to their homeland, hunt bison, and reestablish trade relations. All the Jumano asked is that the Spanish ally themselves with the Jumano and against the Apache. They also informed the Spanish that, only six days journey down the Rio del Norte (Rio Grande River), friends of the Jumano, the Julime Indians, had many fields sown with wheat, corn, and 101

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beans (Wade 2003: 237). Furthermore, the Jumano told them, the “Tejas” were anxious to meet the Spanish and wanted them to settle in their lands. The Jumano offered to arrange a meeting and guide the Spanish to the Julime Indians. In short, they offered the Spanish everything they so desperately needed: food, allies, trade, and a chance to settle a far richer land. The Jumano also informed the Spanish: [O]ther spaniards very white and with red hair came by the sea in wooden houses that walk on the water and they bring them some earrings [and] things that amaze them much and with which they buy from them [the Jumano], the indians of the texas [Tejas] nation and others, deer skins, buffalo skins, shoes, tents, and other things they [the Jumano and other nations] have. (“Declaration of Juan Sabeata,” 11 August 1683 [Wade 2003: 237])

Sabeata’s words could not have been more provocative both in content and timing. The Jumano offered the refugees exactly what they needed at precisely the right time, and their news of other Europeans in Texas galvanized the Spanish imperial government into action. Before the year was out, the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition was dispatched from El Paso to Central Texas. Sabeata’s declaration led to several Spanish expeditions into Texas to thwart what were then considered French advances into the region. These ventures eventually resulted in the establishment of a series of Spanish missions and presidios in East and South Texas (Foster 1995). In fact, Sabeata was likely describing a visit some forty years earlier by “Hollanders” to the Rio Grande delta. In this account, earlier recounted by Alonso de León, Dutch trading vessels landed and exchanged trinkets with the natives (Duaine 1971: 115–117). It may also be telling that the Jumano, during discussions with the Spanish, failed to mention their own participation in the Tejas Alliance. Despite the fact that the Jumano are included as members of the Tejas Alliance in every historical list of the Tejas (see lists below), Sabeata never mentioned Jumano membership in the alliance and instead, used the term “Tejas” to refer to various tribes in eastern Texas (primarily the Caddo). This appears, at first, to be an odd oversight on the part of the Jumano since the Spanish were interested in meeting the Tejas. However, the Spanish were also obviously angered by and fearful of the French in East Texas, suspecting them of trading firearms to Native Americans. Such trade was prohibited under Spanish law, but, as the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition would soon learn, some individuals in the Jumano lands already possessed firearms. Sabeata may have reasoned that if the Jumano had participated in such 102

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interactions indirectly—say, from the French to the Tejas to the Jumano— then perhaps the Spanish would ignore the transgressions. It is likely, then, that Sabeata purposefully distanced himself and the Jumano from the Tejas Alliance in the presence of the Spanish. Nevertheless, his declaration clearly reflects different identities and interactions being manipulated and combined in several different contexts in order to secure some advantage or achieve objectives. It is also interesting to consider how Sabeata may have presented his meeting with the Spanish to the Tejas, perhaps telling them he had secured an exclusive audience. Sabeata’s declaration strongly suggests that at least some hunter-gatherer groups in Texas were sophisticated diplomats and negotiators, quite capable of assuming various identities and manipulating interaction beyond the local community scale—in this case, two European imperial powers and the Tejas Alliance—to suit their own needs. Although the Jumano were correct that the French sought to establish a settlement in Texas, it is difficult to understand precisely how they knew this in 1683. The La Salle Expedition left France under the command of René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle in 1684 with four ships and nearly three hundred people and en route lost one ship to privateers and nearly a third of the remaining expedition to disease. They overshot the mouth of the Mississippi by hundreds of miles, ran two ships aground on the Texas coast where they broke apart, and lost most of their cargo. The remaining vessel returned to France with as many people as possible, marooning some 180 men, women, and children at the mouth of a small creek on the Texas coast (Foster 1998: 4). It was here that La Salle established Fort Saint Louis, where most of the remaining colonists would die of smallpox and/or at the hands of hostile Native Americans (Foster 1998). French documents indicate that smallpox ran rampant through Fort St. Louis and no doubt also significantly affected local indigenous groups (Foster 1998: 289). La Salle was assassinated in East Texas by his own men in 1687 as they were attempting to reach the Mississippi River, then Canada, and eventually France. Only six men out of La Salle’s entire colony would return to France, among them Henri Joutel, who kept a journal that is widely accepted as the “most comprehensive and authoritative” account of the ill-fated expedition (Foster 1998: 4). Sabeata could not have known the full extent of France’s plans when he spoke before the governor of New Mexico in 1683. But his news, delivered a year before the La Salle Expedition landed on the Texas coast, demonstrates excellent intelligence gathering and/or a gift for prophecy. Again, a close read of the documentary evidence hints at a much more pervasive European pres103

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ence in Texas. Sabeata’s 1683 declaration also suggests a diplomatic aplomb resulting from years of experience negotiating with Europeans and Native Americans alike. This document also indicates that Native Americans were not only aware of activities happening hundreds of miles from their home territory, but were also savvy enough to use this knowledge to manipulate the Spanish. Although it is not within the scope of this discussion to fully address the impact of European diseases, they are relevant in terms of population decline and their effect on pre-existing social, economic, and political organizations. Gerhard (1993) documented wave after wave of epidemics beginning in Huaxteca, Mexico, in the 1520s; Nueva Galicia, 1545–1548; and Nueva Vizcaya in 1577. The outbreak of smallpox among French colonists at Fort St. Louis in the late seventeenth century undoubtedly had an impact on Native American populations in that area. As Miller points out, “Indirect and direct contact (both short and long term) are critical variables . . . . Indirect contact with Europeans, through intermediaries, led to the spread of Old World diseases among natives prior to the first direct contact.” These meetings were often followed by short-term direct contact and successively longer-term direct contact until permanent settlements were established (Miller 1996: 128). This pattern of interaction led to successive waves of epidemics occurring with horrific regularity and spreading from one area to the next. Perhaps the best documented example of this was a typhus epidemic that began in central Mexico in A.D. 1736, moved to Nueva Galicia and Nueva Vizcaya then on to Sinaloa in 1737, reaching Nuevo Leon in 1738, Texas in 1739, Ostimiri in 1740, and finally Baja California in 1742 (Gerhard 1993: 26). But the impact of European diseases is acutely apparent at a smaller (i.e., culture area) scale. For example, Smith (1998: 175–176) states that the entire Caddo population was reduced by more than half between A.D. 1691 and A.D. 1721 and one group, the Nabitis, disappeared entirely. Therefore, conceptualizing the early Historic Period as a time of little European impact is erroneous. However, despite documentary evidence for European impacts on Native Americans, such as epidemics, slave raids, and firearms in Central and South Texas prior to A.D. 1700, there is little material evidence of this contact. Given the severity of these impacts, it seems likely that there would be some evidence of European contact in Native American sites dating to this period. However, Miller’s investigation of the skeletal remains of native populations in Texas found nothing that could “be directly linked with a specific skeletal reaction” (1996: 128). Combined with the paucity of European artifacts in the material record, the evidence for European contact is difficult to reconcile against the documentary record. 104

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However, the early Historic Period only spans about 175 years (ca. A.D. 1525–1700), which is not a great deal of time for the admittedly sparse odd bit of European material to make its way to Texas, accumulate, and form a distinguishable archaeological component. Furthermore, the subsequent three hundred years between A.D. 1700 and the present is plenty of time for any type of perishable material to deteriorate. Alternatively, durable materials (such as metal, glass, and diagnostic ceramics) represent the best opportunity for observing European artifacts in the archaeological record. But these materials are also heavy, and it is unlikely, at least initially, that the Spanish transported large quantities of metal, glass, and ceramics across vast arid portions of New Mexico and West Texas to trade with Native Americans in Central Texas. It is more likely that durable goods were transported in small increments and, thus, the frequency of artifacts in an archaeological context would be low. Given the seasonal movements of hunter-gatherer communities over the course of a year, one would also expect Europeans to visit Native groups at a specific time and location every year. This suggests that distributions of durable European goods were confined to a few specific sites, perhaps corresponding to annual aggregation points where indigenous groups met along the edges of sociocultural boundaries. From these locations, durable goods would be dispersed along smaller networks. But the general absence of foreign goods suggests they were not being traded to Native Americans in great quantities. In contrast, areas with navigable rivers and streams, like those found in East Texas, provided an excellent means for transporting heavy materials. Furthermore, the French had already mastered transporting goods over vast distances by canoe in Canada and the Mississippi Valley, and Joutel described numerous instances in which La Salle’s expedition used native canoes for transportation during the late seventeenth century (Foster 1998). In general, the frequency of durable historic artifacts (glass beads and various metal artifacts made of brass—e.g., butt plates, kettle ears, tinklers, and projectile points) found at sites in East Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana (Blaine 1992, Harris and Harris 1962, Jelks 1967, Kidder 1998) also supports the idea that the distribution of durable goods was linked to water transport. For example, in far East Texas, caches containing hundreds of glass beads have been reported along stream banks by archaeological stewards with the Texas Historical Commission (Durst, personal communication 2006). That the French came to Texas to trade durable goods in bulk is further substantiated by artifacts recovered from La Salle’s ship, La Belle. An estimated 790,000 glass beads were found on the ship, more than 500,000 in a single 105

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box in the aft hold (Bruseth and Turner 2005: 87). In addition, although the Spanish had forbidden the sale or trade of firearms to Native Americans, the French operated under no such limitations. Thus, in East Texas, there was a brisk trade among Europeans and Native Americans based on guns, durable French goods, furs (bison, deer, and beaver), and other natural resources easily transported by canoe. But if the French were trading durable goods to sedentary agriculturalists in East Texas by canoe, how were the Spanish interacting with the mobile hunter-gatherers of Central Texas? During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Spanish in Texas focused on locating and extracting resources valuable to the Spanish Crown. This included indigenous peoples, who were needed as replacements for the ever-shrinking labor pool in Mexico. It is likely that Spanish forays into the interior were organized along the lines of a rapid strike force that traveled very light and fast. They would have carried little in the way of material goods and left even less behind. It should be no surprise then that the material signatures of these brief forays into Texas are not more evident in the archaeological record. However, frequent visits by the Spanish to Jumano lands in the mid- and late seventeenth century suggest a much more benign relationship based on trade. Referring again to Sabeata’s declaration of August 1683: [I]f they [the Spanish] wanted to go to their lands [Jumano lands] and ranchería and help them against the apaches, they would profit and they would trade as they had always done the things they [the Jumano] had, such as deer gamusas, shoes and buffalo skins. (“Declaration of Juan Sabeata,” 11 August 1683 [Wade 2003: 237])

Sabeata’s declaration indicates that the character of Spanish and Jumano interaction was based on trade and protection. Specifically, the Jumano traded primarily in hides and leather goods and the Spanish supplied some sort of protection against the Apache. The absence of durable European goods, such as metal and glass, from all but a handful of Native American sites suggests that these types of materials were not being traded and, if they were, certainly not in great quantities. Although the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition of 1683–1684 reported guns among the Jumano (Wade 2003: 98), the Spanish prohibition on trading firearms to Native Americans, combined with the Jumano ties to the Caddo through the Tejas Alliance, suggest these guns were supplied by the French. Given the distance between New Mexico and Central Texas and the absence of navigable waterways, it seems likely the Spanish opted for trade goods with a high value-to-weight ratio. 106

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In fact, there is some documentary evidence to support this and also suggest that the residents of New Mexico probably did not have much in the way of durable goods to trade. Wagon trains from Mexico were the source, if infrequent, of all European goods coming into New Mexico. Hodge et al. (1945) in Appendix IV of Benavides’ Revised Memorial of 1634 includes a “List of Supplies for Benavides and Companions Going to New Mexico” by wagon train between 1624 and 1626. With the exception of thousands of nails, fifty axes, and one hundred hoes, durable goods are not represented in particularly large numbers. Only four copper kettles, twelve copper pans, six brass mortars, and six frying pans are noted (Hodges et al. 1945: 111–112). In addition, many items—for example, Mexican sandals, blankets, knives, and scissors—are grouped in sets of fifty-two, two pairs for each of the twenty-six friars assigned to the colony (Hodges et al. 1945: 111–112, 116). Religious paraphernalia is listed in sets of eleven, which suggests one set for each mission in the colony. Food was also imported, including beans, lentils, cheese, pasta, and salted fish and pork. In short, virtually everything in this inventory appears destined for either ecclesiastical purposes or the utilitarian necessities of the colony. Notable exceptions include “macaw feathers,” “a gross of little bells,” and “twelve bundles of glass beads,” all totaling fewer than eighty pesos (Hodges et al. 119). Beyond these few trinkets, there is no evidence of trade items in this inventory. As a historical document, the Benavides supply list provides a number of interesting insights. First, heavy durable goods were not entering New Mexico in large numbers. Second, the heavy durable goods that were imported were being used by the colonists and were not traded across the Plains. Third, the few items that likely represent trade goods were lightweight and portable. Fourth, these trade items were similar, if not identical, to prehistoric trade goods. Coronado noted that hunter-gatherers living east of the Pueblos traded dressed hides for cotton textiles and macaw feathers (Flint and Flint 2005). Although the identities of those conducting the trade may have changed from prehistory into the period of European contact, the types of goods and the character of interaction seemed to have remained the same—at least for Texas hunter-gatherers. A Plains-Pueblo trade system incorporating hides for cotton textiles was in place prior to European contact. It is also unlikely that pre-contact trade items would have lost their currency when European goods were introduced, certainly not in terms of the classes of artifacts (personal adornment and textiles). In fact, forty years before Benavides’s supply list was written, “beads, hats, and other articles” were passed out to Native Americans at La Junta de Los Rios by the Espejo Expedition (Hammond and Rey 1966: 216, 217). 107

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Then, as now, fine leather goods and cotton textiles were universally recognized as valued commodities. Nevertheless, these types of trade goods, such as cotton mantas and Spanish textiles, would not have survived as part of the archaeological record. Pre–Columbian trade also faced high transportation costs, and Plains groups employed pack dogs to offset those costs (Flint and Flint 2005, Forrestal 1954, Hammond and Rey 1966, Polt 1999). When the Spanish arrived on horseback, the tempo and the volume of this trade almost certainly increased, and the Spanish demand for hides likely also increased as they became more established in New Mexico. But the overall population of huntergatherers supplying hides in the western portion of Texas during the early Historic Period was also in a state of decline due to the introduction of European diseases. This suggests that hunter-gatherers’ demand for goods from the Spanish and/or the Pueblos may have declined as well, at least initially, and provides a motive for early Spanish visits to the Texas interior and the Jumano homeland. Although drawn first to the population and material attributes of sedentary agriculturalists, the Spanish were consistently impressed by the leather goods of Texas hunter-gatherers. Every known account of Coronado’s expedition to the Plains mentions the leather products of the indigenous peoples, including tents, dressed hides, shirts, pants, and shoes (Flint and Flint 2005). Forty years later, Espejo noted the same: The chamois is made from deerskins as well tanned as the ones from Flanders. The hides are from the humpbacked cattle called “Cibola” (buffalo)— the hair resembling that of Irish cattle. The Indians tan these hides in the same manner that elk is tanned in Flanders, and use them to make footwear. (Antonio de Espejo 1582, translated by Hammond and Rey 1966: 217)

According to Benavides, by 1630 the Spanish were ardent consumers of bison products: “These skins provide the dress commonly worn by both Indians and Spaniards” (Forrestal 1954: 53–54). Furthermore, it is widely documented throughout the early Historic Period that the primary commodity exchanged by sedentary agriculturalists for leather goods was cotton textiles (Forrestal 1954, Hammond and Rey 1966, Hodge et al. 1945, Flint and Flint 2005, Polt 1999). Again citing Benavides, “They trade these hides throughout the entire region . . . . On their backs the people carry their merchandise, which they exchange for cotton fabric” (Forrestal 1954: 54). It is also important to remember that the Spanish were not necessarily offering new tools or trinkets, only similar objects manufactured from slightly 108

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more sophisticated materials, such as brass, iron, and glass. Comparable materials of a lower grade (chert, obsidian, and copper) were available to Native Americans and, in the case of chert, in far greater abundance. There is virtually no place on the Edwards Plateau or downstream along the rivers flowing off the plateau that tool-grade chert is not available. In addition, the alibates deposits in the Texas Panhandle and obsidian deposits in New Mexico have been quarried for thousands of years. Colorful marine shells from the Pacific, Atlantic, and the Gulf of Mexico; turquoise from Arkansas and New Mexico; and hoof tinklers, copper bells, and colorful feathers were also available ( Jurney and Young 1995). Thus, comparable items existed and were widely traded long before European contact. Furthermore, even if Native Americans were enamored with European materials, a primary problem with reliance on imported goods is maintenance, repair, and replacement. Therefore, it seems likely that both the Spanish and the Native Americans realized that a more lucrative business lay in simply ramping up the existing textiles-for-hides trade. This, however, should not suggest that the Spanish did not have a significant impact on other markets and the economy of Native Americans as a whole during the so-called Protohistoric Period. In fact, the Spanish inserted themselves squarely in the middle of the Native American trade in textile and hide products, which may well have been the primary commodities. The introduction of the horse almost certainly increased the volume and speed of transport. But hunter-gatherers, at least initially, supplied both the product (through bison, deer, and antelope hunting) and the labor (hide processing). Thus, any increase in volume was based on the number of hunter-gatherers available and their willingness or susceptibility to coercion. Although the presence of Spanish goods in both the documentary and archaeological records is extremely limited, it is, nonetheless, there. Furthermore, the presence of European trinkets suggests their use in specific situations, perhaps to facilitate interaction among key individuals, such as the leaders or caciques. In turn, the limited distribution of items often creates opportunities for individuals to distinguish themselves by gaining access to exotic goods and increasing individual prestige or status in one’s own group and among broader social networks. This scenario also helps to explain, given the scarcity of European artifacts in historic Native American sites in Central Texas, how trade was conducted between New Mexico and Central Texas Native American groups as well as what was being traded. There is also some documentary evidence to support the conclusion that Spanish settlers in New Mexico were not only engaging in this type of trade 109

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but also establishing secondary businesses. Expeditions from the time of the Castillo-Martín Expedition of 1650 specifically mention the bounty of hides taken from Central Texas. Despite Sabeata’s mention of shoes in 1683, the vast majority of these leather goods appear to have been in the form of hides rather than finished or manufactured products. The documentary records also show that in the 1660s, Captain Hernán Martín Serrano, also known as Hernán Martín, an encomendero, “owned and operated an ‘obraje’ (textile manufacturing shop) that used Indian laborers” (Esquibel 2007: 45). This Captain Hernán Martín Serrano is almost certainly the same Captain Hernán Martín of the Castillo-Martín Expedition of 1650. It also seems likely that Hernán Martín, as well as other Spanish soldiers, established and maintained their own relationships with people living in bison country when they ventured into the Jumano homeland in the mid-seventeenth century. Thus, the nature of Martín’s business could have focused on exporting cotton textiles to the Jumano in return for bison hides, which were then processed into finished leather goods in his obraje. Although this type of documentation constitutes little more than circumstantial evidence, it does provide tantalizing clues to the character of Spanish interests in Texas during this early period. Some documents also indicate the continuity of Spanish interests through time. For example, in October 1683, a Captain Fernando Martín Serrano was appointed interpreter for Juan Sabeata in El Paso (Wade 2003: 238), and in 1684, a Captain Hernando Martín Serrano was appointed official Jumano interpreter by Juan Domínguez de Mendoza midway through the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition (Imhoff 2002: 111, Wade 2003: 118). These accounts suggest that, during the late seventeenth century, the Jumano language was not widely spoken among Spanish colonists and required an interpreter. The position of interpreter and the similarity of names and rank also suggest that Fernando Martín and Hernando Martín were the same person. Also intriguing is the matter of where and how he (Fernando/Hernando Martín) learned Jumano. One possible explanation is that he was a close relative of Captain Hernán Martín Serrano of the Castillo-Martín Expedition of 1650. If he was indeed related to Captain Hernán Martín Serrano, then Hernando Martín Serrano may well have learned the Jumano language in the captain’s obraje or on visits to the Jumano homeland in the mid-seventeenth century. A closer examination of Spanish colonial relationships also suggests that the presence of Hernando Martín Serrano on the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition was no coincidence. Church and military records clearly demonstrate that the colonists were a small group, intimately tied together through long110

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standing political, economic, and social relationships. In fact, Hernando Martín Serrano was not only listed as a Jumano interpreter in the MendozaLopez Expedition records, but also as an extended family member of the expedition leader, Juan Domínguez de Mendoza. Mendoza had, some thirty years earlier, accompanied Sergeant Major Diego de Guadalajara on his expedition to the Jumano homeland in 1654 (Kenmotsu 2001, Wade 2003: 74). It may well have been the case that in 1654 the elder Captain Hernán Martín Serrano, as one of the former commanders of the Castillo-Martín Expedition in 1650, managed to secure a position on the Guadalajara Expedition for a young Mendoza. By including young Fernando/Hernando Martín on the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition in 1684, Mendoza repaid a family favor and supplied the expedition with two valuable assets: a military captain and an interpreter. It is important to consider that individual, family, and group identities and interactions undergo significant changes through time, strengthening some relationships and weakening others. Nevertheless, these documents suggest a long and intimate relationship among these people spanning generations. These relationships appear to have occurred among, as well as between, the Spanish colonists and various Native American groups, and there is no reason to believe these were isolated events limited to the “Martín Serranos” and the “Sabeatas.” Despite characterizations of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as a time in which there was little or no Spanish impact on the economic, social, and political organization of indigenous groups in Texas, the documentation indicates otherwise. While it is true that European incursions into northern Mexico and Texas wreaked havoc on local populations, the flexible character of hunter-gatherer identity and interaction also proved persistent, and the resilience of prehistoric traditions should not be ignored. Instead, this era is, perhaps, best understood as a continuous process of adaptation and change in which all participants, Europeans and Native Americans, used and modified preexisting patterns and established new ones.

the doCUmentary evIdenCe for soCIoCULtUraL IdentIty and soCIaL fIeLds The conceptual framework introduced in previous chapters describes numerous hunter-gatherer communities occupying more or less fixed territories and larger social aggregates, such as marriage/linguistic groups, also inhabiting specific geographic areas. Nonetheless, groups often gained access to 111

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resources in other areas through social interaction. Broad-spectrum foragers documented in the twentieth century showed significant variation in terms of the size, mobility, sex, age, and practices of individuals in the community over the course of a year, even within the fixed territory of a single band. Ethnographic data also suggest that social relationships between distant cultural groups were sometimes established in order to mitigate the effects of variable regional environment. It is this complex web of social relationships linking distinct areas, cultures, languages, and environments into a sort of regional population that characterizes a social field (Welsch and Terrell 1998: 53). Thus, a social field implies even greater variability and mobility for individuals and bands beyond the territorial and areal boundaries of community and marriage group. In short, some or all of the members of a band could find themselves residing temporarily in a different community with a different cultural group and/or members of one band could be scattered in different communities over a large region simultaneously and/or at different times of the year, depending on the political, social, or economic climate in either local or regional environments. Given the premium placed on social flexibility, we should expect to see numerous configurations of social organization at different times and in different places, depending on the nature of the social, economic, and political environment. Along these same lines, Wade (2003) has eschewed the anthropological concepts of “bands” and “tribes” in favor of the concept of group: The concept of group—two or more individuals who view themselves as constituting an aggregate—has the conceptual and anthropologic plasticity to allow researchers to designate such socially related aggregates as groups, and thus facilitate research for additional information about the nature of their social structure. (Wade 2003: xxii)

In situations where there is little baseline data available, such as Central and South Texas during the Late Prehistoric and early Historic Periods, the term “group” can be used to describe many types of aggregate social organizations that are not clearly understood. Ethnicity, on the other hand, is derived from interviews with informants and often contains specific attributes defining social organization, such as language, religion, political affiliation, morphological characteristics, geographic location, and ancestry ( Jones 1997). These data often permit a much richer contextualization of social organization. However, models of ethnicity may also be implicitly or more easily accepted simply due to their robust data set when compared to prehistoric or early historic contexts. Thus, the application of ethnic models in these 112

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types of situations may be wholly inappropriate due to the unintended, but often inherent, bias that may obscure largely unknown and/or unique social structures. In Texas, anthropologists and historians often have little more than a name for hunter-gatherer groups recorded by various European chroniclers. The Spanish generally referred to these groups as naciones, or nations, and rarely distinguished whether they were referring to a group of families, a hunting party of men, or some other configuration. As Wade indicates, the term “group” can be distinguished both internally by the group that is felt (the aggregate of individuals that see themselves as members of the group) and externally by the group that is observed (through historic documents, ethnographic investigations, or archaeological sites) (Wade 2003: xxii). At least some European documentation confirms this; Joutel’s journal notes some Native Americans were keenly interested in naming allies as well as enemies (Foster 1998: 170–171, 246–247). Despite some repetition, the sheer number of indigenous groups recorded is impressive. Some names were almost certainly mispronounced or misheard. It is difficult to judge precisely how a seventeenth-century French or Spanish speaker heard the various group names spoken in various Native American tongues and how they transcribed these names. Nevertheless, even comparisons of French and Spanish lists show significant overlap. The list below is based primarily on a compilation of historical documents from the Bosque-Larios Expedition of A.D. 1675 and the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition A.D. 1683–1684 by Wade (2003). She identified twenty-two Native American groups living on the Edwards Plateau between A.D. 1673 and 1700. Apache Ape Arame Arcos Tuertos Bagname Bobole Ervipiame Gediondo (Hutaca or Parugan) Geniocane Gueiquesale Jumano

Jumee Mabibit (Bibit) Manos Prietas Ocane Pataguache Pinanaca Siano (Sana) Teaname Tereoodan (Terecoda) Xaeser Xoma

The second list shows thirty- one groups identified in ecclesiastical and civil records and censuses between approximately A.D. 1675 and 1700. These 113

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groups occupied or used the lands adjacent to and north of the Amistad National Recreation Area (Amistad NRA), which is located immediately southwest of the Edwards Plateau and restricted to the portion of the Rio Grande where it is joined by the Pecos and Devils Rivers (Kenmotsu and Wade 2002: 8, 33–39). Apache Ape Bagname Bibit (Mabibit) Bobole Cacaxtle Cibolo Ervipiame Gediondo Gueiquesale Julime Jumee Machome Manos Prietas Mescal Mesquite

Muruame Ocane Pacuache Pacuachiam Papanac Pinanaca Saesse Siano (Sana) Teaname Teimamar Teneimamar Terocodame Tilijae Tilpayay Yori

Combined, these produce a list of thirty-eight different groups recorded between A.D. 1673 and A.D. 1700. Although a total of twenty-three names from both lists do not match, the majority of these come from the longer and later list. Thus, fully fifteen names from both lists match. It may also be significant that by A.D. 1700, the Apache had moved farther south and had begun raiding into Central and South Texas as well as Mexico. Therefore, the later and larger list of groups from A.D. 1700 may represent displaced and/ or remnants of groups that once inhabited areas farther north. The third list, compiled from Foster (1995), presents fifty- one Native American groups recorded by various Spanish expeditions (primarily de León, Terán, and Salinas) between A.D. 1689 and 1693. Documents from these entradas clearly state that the Spanish followed Native American trails, some marked by stone cairns, across south Texas. In short, the documentary record from these expeditions indicates widely recognized primary routes linking various groups from what is today the Amistad NRA on the Rio Grande with groups living in East Texas along the Trinity River. Although this list dates to roughly the same period as the previous lists, it represents a far larger reporting area. Therefore, it is understandable that many of these 114

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names do not match those in the lists above. Nevertheless, there are some matches with a total of ten group names occurring in the three lists. Agualohe Aguapalam Alachome Ape (Hape) Apaysi Cacase Cacaxtle Caisquetebana Cantona Catqueza Cava Caynaaya Chaguan Chalome Cibola Coco Emet Hasinai Jumano (Chomene, Chome,  Comane) Mescal Momon Muruam Naaman Ocana (Ocane) Odoesmade

Paac Pacpul Pacuache Pacuasin Pamaya Papanac Parchaque Pastaloca Pataguo Patchal (Pachal) Patsua Payaya Pitahay Quem Sacuache Samampac Sampanal Sana (Sanac, Xanac) Saquita Simaoma Tepacuache Toboso Tohaha (Toaa) Toho (Too) Vanca Xiabu (Ijiaba)

Finally, a fourth list, compiled from the journal of Henri Joutel (Foster 1998), provides a French account of fifty Native American groups observed between the Nueces and Sabine Rivers of South and East Texas from A.D. 1684 to 1687. Joutel’s journal offers an interesting contrast to various Spanish accounts recorded just a few years later. Although the number of groups is about the same, many of the names appear to be different. However, the poor correlation between Spanish and French renderings of Native American group names may reveal more about the differences between the two European languages than about the presence or absence of indigenous groups in this area at this time. This suggests that resolving linguistic inconsistencies between various French and Spanish versions of indigenous group names, if 115

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possible, would be a significant contribution to ethnohistoric research. Even allowing for duplication from one list to the next, the number of groups documented indicates many distinct sociocultural groups occupied Central and South Texas during the early Colonial Period. Ahehouen Ahouergomahe Arhau Ayenny Bracamo Cascosi (Clamcoeh) Cenis Chancre Chaumene Choumay ( Jumano) Coyabegux Ebahamo Exepiahohe Kannehouan Keremen Kemahopihein Kiabaha Kiabahe Koienkahe Komkome Kouyam Kuasse Meghey (Mayaye) Meraquaman Naodiche

Nasoni Ointemarhen Omenaosse Onapiem Orcan Palaquechare Panequo Pechir Peinhoum Peissaquo Petao Petsare Piechar Quouan Serecoutcha Spichehat Teao Tehauremet Teheaman Telamene Temerlouan Tohau (Toho) Tohaha Tsepcoen Tserabocherete

Although it is unclear precisely what sort of social organization these names represent, there is little question as to their existence. Moreover, on a very broad scale at least two levels of social organization can be distinguished: at the local level, a band represented by a single community and, at the regional level, a social field represented by numerous communities, social aggregates, and marriage/linguistic groups with, perhaps, the sum of the groups listed above interacting together. In addition to these dimensions of identity and interaction, there were undoubtedly more intermediate dimensions in which several adjacent communities might consider themselves a specific cultural group, perhaps constituting a marriage group. Such a group might also 116

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bond with one or more other groups who spoke the same language and were of similar size and configuration, forming a larger social aggregate such as the Caddo mentioned earlier. For example, the events surrounding Juan Sabeata’s declaration indicate that the Jumano aggregate also consisted of several communities or rancherías (Wade 2003: 236), and the Karankawa of the Central Texas coast are recognized historically by five major groups (Cópanes, Coapites, Cujanes, Carancaguases, and Cocos), all speaking the same language and practicing virtually identical subsistence and settlement patterns (Ricklis 1996). As McBrinn (2005) notes, it is through these types of large, stable, and internalized (primarily through marriage and language) social aggregates that enduring cultural identities or, according to Jones (1997), ethnic identities form. However, the coastal groups of Native Americans with which Cabeza de Vaca initially made contact lived in at least two locations and practiced two forms of subsistence over the course of a year. During the fall and winter, they lived in villages along the coast and barrier islands to take advantage of the annual fish runs. According to Cabeza de Vaca, this high-protein diet was also supplemented with high-carbohydrate roots (Bolton 1915: 31). This account has been corroborated in at least two ways: 1) early mariner eyewitness descriptions of villages along tidal passages occupied only during the fall and winter seasons, and 2) verification of these early descriptions through archaeological investigations indicating occupation of these sites during seasonal fish runs (Ricklis 1990). During the spring and summer months, Cabeza de Vaca described a dispersed settlement pattern corresponding to the end of peak fish abundance. The aggregated villages split into smaller family bands and migrated inland, up the river valleys into the coastal prairie where they could exploit a wide range of dispersed plants and animals. At this time of year, the Karankawa could depend on large herbivorous game (bison and deer), as well as a wide variety of plant foods (Ricklis 1990: 490). Faunal data from archaeological excavations at various small riverine campsites also corroborate a diet of primarily terrestrial foods (Ricklis 1990). Much of this historic information also appears to be evident in the archaeological record and, in at least some instances, the material culture presents some data not documented historically. For example, the Rockport lithic assemblage is virtually identical to the Toyah lithic assemblage and Rockport Phase ceramics (indicative of the Karankawa) have been documented at Toyah sites well beyond the historically reported range of the Karankawa (e.g., 41JW8) (Black 1986, Ricklis 1996). At least one site, Melon (41RF21), located on the inland margin of the Karankawa range, also strongly sug117

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gests participation in a wider social sphere outside of the Karankawa social aggregate. There, both Toyah and Karankawa ceramics have been recovered in the same stratigraphic contexts, albeit in horizontally separate areas of the site, strongly suggesting contemporaneous occupation by these peoples. Ricklis (1996: 97) suggests this site “represents an encampment shared simultaneously by coastal and inland groups for the purpose of hunting bison.” Cabeza de Vaca also provided an account for another group, known as the Mariames, who lived in the interior. The Mariames inhabited an area along what is known today as the lower Guadalupe River valley for about nine months of the year, exploiting this rich and abundant riparian environment primarily in the fall and winter (Campbell 1988: 17). Cabeza de Vaca first encountered a small band of Mariames while they were gathering pecans in this area (Bolton: 1915: 36). The Mariames have generally been accepted as a Coahuiltecan group, based on their subsistence patterns and a short vocabulary collected by Cabeza de Vaca (Campbell 1988: 16). During the summer months, the Mariames shifted their range to the south to exploit large prickly pear patches (Bolton 1915: 37, Campbell 1988: 11). In addition to edible pads, prickly pears produce a fruit, called “tuna,” that may be eaten raw, squeezed for its juice and dried for later consumption, or roasted (Newcomb 1961: 41–42). This was a time of aggregation for Coahuiltecan groups, and Cabeza de Vaca documented peyote-induced mitotes, celebrations that included all-night dancing and feasting (Newcomb 1961: 54). In fact, this area of South Texas is characterized by high-density and lowdensity resources (Hester 1981), particularly with respect to vegetation. It has scattered perennial water sources and a host of inhospitable plants— including more than twenty species of cactus (Cactaceae) and more than thirty species of acacia (Leguminosae)—and, with the exception of various geophytes and mesquite pods, offers sparse plant nourishment compared to adjacent areas (Everitt and Drawe 1993). At least one significant exception is the seasonal presence of ripe prickly pear tunas, which made it possible for several smaller bands of hunter-gatherers to aggregate in one place during a specific time of the year. Cabeza de Vaca and others have commented on the opportunistic character of the Mariames’ diet, noting that it included frogs, lizards, salamanders, insects, ant eggs, snails, and snakes (Campbell 1988: 20, Newcomb 1961: 41). There are also references to seemingly indigestible things, such as earth, rotten wood, deer dung, and what Cabeza de Vaca referred to as “unmentionables” (Newcomb 1961: 41). One can only wonder what he meant, but this was probably a reference to the practice of the second harvest—retrieving partially digested seeds from human feces and consuming them again. 118

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In short, this cycle may be described as a seasonal migration from the prickly pear patches during the summer to riparian environments in the fall, winter, and spring. The zone between these areas was apparently exploited only for the time it took to travel through it (Campbell 1988: 17). Aggregation into macrobands apparently corresponded with the ripening of prickly pear tunas in the summer. When this resource was exhausted, the macroband dispersed into microbands and returned to riparian environs. The Karankawa and Mariame examples indicate that, in addition to a group represented by a single band of a few families, several related bands formed larger social aggregates. They spoke the same language and practiced similar subsistence and residential patterns and participated as individuals, families, and bands with each other. These social aggregates—which we may view as marriage/linguistic groups—also participated in whole or in part with other social aggregates. Thus, the possible permutations of interrelated individuals, families, bands, languages, and kinship groups, and their various social interactions, quickly become overwhelmingly complex indeed, almost unmanageable. However, Wade (2001: 46) indicates that in order for such relationships to function smoothly, “it is imperative to know what to expect and how to behave,” and she suggests many distinct cultural groups in Texas were united by a “behavioral baseline” that also functioned as a mechanism for dispute resolution. Wade’s (2001) work uses early documentary evidence (La Relación by Álvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, the Bosque-Larios Expedition, and Henri Joutel’s journal) to demonstrate that, particularly on the central Gulf Coastal Plain, at least three practices—avoidance, ritualization, and exchange—formed the behavioral baseline for relationships among distinct Native American culture groups. Avoidance appears to have been a well-established hunter-gatherer practice attuned to the scarcity and/or abundance of resources. The practice also served to maintain contact proscriptions among specific kin and effectively limited contact with unknown or potentially hostile groups (Wade 2001: 46). Ritualization is perhaps most evident in accounts of hospitality and warfare in which sharing and aggression followed well-defined repeated patterns that appeared to function at different levels depending on who and how many individuals and groups were involved (48). Exchange was apparently based on reciprocity and/or barter in three categories that often crosscut one another: 1) goods for solidarity, 2) goods for services, and 3) goods for goods (50–52). In addition, Cabeza de Vaca also encountered similar baseline behavior among groups at La Junta de los Rios in West Texas, noting that host groups would pile all their worldly possessions together and visitors were free to take what they wished. 119

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Although Wade provides good examples of a well-established and widely practiced Native American behavioral baseline, it is the ignorance of the Europeans, in contrast, that is most revealing. The documents clearly indicate that early Spanish, as well as French, encounters with indigenous peoples resulted in hostilities due to behavioral violations committed by Europeans. For example, La Salle’s men stole the belongings, including canoes, from a group of Native Americans along the Texas coast when it is likely they could easily have bartered for the items. Similarly, when Coronado’s vanguard entered the camp of the Teyas, the Native Americans had piled all their possessions, including numerous worked hides in a large tent, demonstrating a cultural baseline common throughout the region. But the expedition members, ignorant of the prescribed behavior, plundered their possessions, taking everything and reducing the Teyas to tears (Flint and Flint 2005: 409). Repeated attempts by Native Americans to acquaint Europeans with basic regional social etiquette make it difficult to dismiss these unfortunate events simply as examples of unwitting European ignorance. Instead, these documents suggest a sort of willful ignorance and ethnocentrism on the part of the Spanish and, to a lesser extent, the French. Moreover, the difference between the two in terms of how they interacted with Native Americans may have simply been in the size of their parties. In short, the larger the European party, the less likely they were willing to negotiate. Ironically, Wade’s primary point, that a widely practiced behavioral baseline governed relationships among distinct Native American cultural groups in Texas, is emphatically driven home by the Europeans’ documentation of their own failed attempts to interact with different groups. As noted, historical accounts often differ dramatically in terms of their descriptions of various Native American groups and of the extent to which their relations with local peoples were hostile. In general, smaller expeditions appear to have produced much more detailed descriptions of specific communities and cultural groups and to have had better relations with those groups. The accounts from the largest expeditions, such as the Coronado and de Soto/Moscoso entradas, tend to blur the distinctions between communities and cultural groups and/or the events that transpired. Furthermore, poor relations and violence are a consistent theme. For example, Puebloan groups were often referred to simply as the Indians from the “flat-roofed houses” (Flint and Flint 2005: 514, 517) by the Coronado chroniclers, and it appears that all Plains groups were combined into essentially three categories: Querechos, Teyas, and the residents of Quivira. In contrast, small parties possessed none of the military or technological 120

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advantages mustered by large expeditions. In the absence of obvious coercive power, they focused their attention on subsistence and the technology at hand, as well as the customs and knowledge necessary to live in what was to them a strange and forbidding land. For example, Henri Joutel’s account describes how a small party of Frenchmen is forced to engage Native Americans on their own terms: Yes, I was quite often there to smoke with those who came to see us. La Salle, who did not smoke tobacco, told me to keep the natives company for it was necessary to use discretion with them so as not to offend them. In truth, small in number as we were, we had no hope of passing through their area forcibly. ( Joutel in Foster 1998: 173)

Historical documents from these smaller expeditions also repeatedly refer to numerous distinct groups constantly in contact with one another. But these groups are seldom identified by anything more than a name, thus, they may have been individuals from the hunting party of a single band or several band members from different communities of the same marriage/linguistic group. These same accounts indicate it is likely that when Native Americans gave a distinct name for a group, they were referring to at least a single community, if not several communities, or a marriage group, all of whom spoke the same language. Indeed, the only exception to this is when Native Americans discuss the Tejas Alliance and its members. Despite the freedom of interaction among various Native American groups, the combination of many different groups and configurations (e.g., individuals, families, bands, factions, and social aggregates and various permutations of all these) all moving about in the same region and relying on similar resources suggests a potentially volatile social situation due to competition for resources. However, a behavioral baseline facilitated interaction among these groups and greatly reduced the potential for warfare (Wade 2001). Joutel, while camped in the immediate vicinity of the Sandbur Site (41FY135) near the present town of La Grange on the Colorado River, wrote about the numerous Native Americans that came to visit: They made us understand that they came to see us because of what their allies had told them, that we harmed no one . . . . They told us they sometimes went to war with tribes to the east but that their strongest enemies were from the southwest where they indicated there were a number of tribes against them at war. They also said they were allies of 45 tribes, that few of them were stationary, most roving, living off only hunting and 121

L and of the tejas fishing like those which we had encountered before. For this reason they disperse to different places in order to subsist better, and they drive the bison back and forth to each other. It seemed from this that the woods and the rivers are their boundaries for hunting. There were many Indians in this region, and that was the reason we had not had plenty to hunt. ( Joutel in Foster 1998: 170, 172)

Joutel’s account clearly indicates that numerous hunter-gatherer groups simultaneously occupied this region at least temporarily and imposed some pressure on the available resources, which, in turn, forced them to disperse. Although it is unclear if the term “tribes” refers to individual bands/cultural groups or to a larger social aggregate, an alliance of forty-five “tribes” certainly suggests a sizable interaction sphere. The fact that they represented distinct cultural groups is further reinforced by Joutel: The Indians came to see us every day that we remained there. They told us many things but it was quite hard to understand them because their language was difficult. Besides, each tribe had its own language or dialect, as it were, or at least there was some variation, which one might expect, since in France we know that the language changes from one province to another even though we trade and speak with one another. ( Joutel in Foster 1998: 173)

Thus, the historical documentation points to a complex regional mosaic of numerous communities/social groups that combined and dissolved, for an indefinite period of time, with other similar groups that may or may not have spoken the same language. Equally complex is the historical documentation concerning the Jumano of Central Texas and West Texas. For example, when the Jumano delegation visited El Paso, Juan Sabeata stated that his party consisted of “twelve Indians of the Jumanas nation, [who are] Captains of different rancherías” (Wade 2003: 236). Such a statement raises several questions about identity. Did the Jumano nation consist of twelve rancherías? If so, did these rancherías constitute individual bands, since they represented distinct communities, or should we view the combined bands/communities as a single marriage or linguistic group, cultural group, or as the social aggregate of the Jumano? Did each ranchería/community/group have a different name? If so, in what situations would they have identified themselves by their community name and in what situations would they have defined themselves by the term “Jumano”? Did the bands residing next to those communities refer to them as “Jumano” or 122

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were they referred to by their own community names? When and how was the use of community and/or social aggregate names and/or identities used by the community and/or “others” (either other Jumano groups or those outside the social aggregate) and how were those relationships defined? Questions associated with identity appear endless. On the one hand, there is no shortage of group names; on the other hand, it is difficult to determine what scale of social organization (i.e., family, band, marriage group, etc.) such names represent. The documentary record is filled with this sort of tantalizing and alternately frustrating information, and the Jumano, perhaps more so than any other group, have come to epitomize this problem. The Jumano are known entirely through early historical accounts (Bolton 1911, Hammond and Rey 1929, Hodge 1911, Imhoff 2002, Kelley 1986, Kenmotsu 2001, Wade 2003), which offer two conflicting views. The most generally accepted description of the Jumano locates them in West Texas and the western Edwards Plateau (Figure 5.3), where they lived as bison hunters in small rancherías (Hammond and Rey 1966, Kelley 1986, Kenmotsu 2001, Wade 2003). But they are also known to have traded and cohabitated with Puebloan agriculturalists living in the Salinas district of central New Mexico in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries and later, during the late seventeenth century, with the small agricultural pueblos of the La Junta region in the Texas Trans-Pecos and Chihuahua, Mexico (Bolton 1911, Hammond and Rey 1929, Ivey 1988). In addition, both the Spanish and the French observed the Jumano on numerous occasions in South and East Texas in the company of various groups, and the Jumano were duly noted as allies of the Caddo group in Joutel’s journal (Foster 1998: 247). Taken individually and out of context, these widely disparate accounts appear contradictory. However, when viewed chronologically and in the broader historical context of Spanish/Indian relations, these seemingly contradictory descriptions can perhaps be explained. The Jumano enter the historical record in 1583 when the Espejo-Luxán party met three “Jumana Indians” hunting bison south of the modern town of Pecos, Texas (Hammond and Rey 1966: 209, Kenmotsu 2001: 24, Wade 2003: 72). Through a Pataraguey interpreter, the three demonstrated knowledge of the Pecos River to the point at which it enters the Rio Grande, indicating a broad geographic knowledge of the region (Kenmotsu 2001: 27, Wade 2003: 72). They led the Spanish to a large encampment along present-day Toyah Creek. Interestingly, Luxán’s account states, “We found many Jumana Indians from the ranchería of the people who were guiding us . . . . They were on their way to the river, to the mesquite trees” (Hammond and Rey 1966: 209). This suggests that the ranchería was occupied by more than one group. Admittedly, this wording, and/or Ham123

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fIgUre 5.3 Jumano homeland and various trade destinations (after Kenmotsu 2001: Figure 1).

mond and Rey’s translation, is somewhat ambiguous. Nevertheless, some (Hickerson 1994: 42–43, Kenmotsu 2001: 27) interpret this passage as an account of Jumano rancherías. But an alternative interpretation might suggest that the Jumano were merely visiting this area, perhaps in the company of other hunter-gatherer cultural groups—perhaps even the Teyas. Such an interpretation is further supported by the fact that, as the Spanish journeyed farther up this creek, they “found settled people of this nation, who in their clothing, appearance, and habitat are similar to the Pataragueyes” (Hammond and Rey 1966: 209–210). This account may not refer to a specifically Jumano community, but instead to an altogether different group that was simply hosting or entertaining individuals and bands from different areas, corresponding perhaps to a regular seasonal aggregation similar to that noted by Cabeza de Vaca in the prickly pear fields of South Texas. The comment that these people 124

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were “settled” and in their “clothing, appearance, and habitat” resembled the people at La Junta de los Rios is also consistent with other settled trading partners and allies of the Jumano (Hammond and Rey 1966: 209–210). This passage may also indicate a previously unknown group of farmers that once resided between the Pueblos of New Mexico and La Junta de los Rios in Texas. Castaño de Sosa, passing through this area fewer than seven years later, acknowledged similar difficulties, despite numerous interpreters, in communicating with local inhabitants (Hammond and Rey 1966: 257). Castaño also reported many “newly deserted rancherías,” and an intensely hostile indigenous population along the Pecos River in Texas (Hammond and Rey 1966: 257–259). Although Castaño mentioned overtaking a group of natives that “had with them some dogs laden with packs,” attempts to communicate with them failed and they were released (Hammond and Rey 1966: 258). The abandonment of their rancherías and the open hostility on the part of the local population also appear to have been rather narrowly directed solely at the Spanish and Native Americans accompanying the Castaño party. This may indicate Spanish slave raiders had recently been operating in this area. In addition, the Native Americans detained by Castaño appeared to have been relatively uninvolved bystanders in these events and the fact that they were traveling with pack dogs strongly suggests they were simply passing through the area. Perhaps, then, they were a Jumano trading party or an Apache scouting expedition. Although the Castaño de Sosa account is rather vague in terms of where and with whom the Spanish were engaged, it does indicate how rapidly the sociopolitical climate could change. In fewer than seven years, the local population in this area had gone from welcoming the Spanish to openly attacking their expeditions. It also suggests that, even under these tense conditions, a trading party could travel with some freedom. Although accounts of Jumano bison hunters are scarce until the seventeenth century, three pueblos in central New Mexico were identified in 1598 as Humanas pueblos, consisting of at least six groups (clans?) of people known to the Spanish as the Cueloce, Cataoce, Quelozey, Pataoce, Patozey, and the Genobey (Kenmotsu 2001: 24). These three have been identified and are known today as Gran Quivira, Pueblo Blanco, and Pueblo Pardo (Ivey 1988: 13–20). What little we know of these people is that they were agriculturalists, some were tattooed (rayado), and that they often traded with bison hunters from the east who were also tattooed (Kenmotsu 2001: 25). In short, the term “Humanas” appears to have been derived from the pueblos’ close ties with the Jumano hunter-gatherers, rather than from their actual membership as Jumano. Nevertheless, the association through repeated interaction obviously 125

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has implications for the construction of identity, resulting in this case in affiliation through name, body adornment, and trade. Drawing on the work of Ivey (1988), Kenmotsu (2001: 24) states that these pueblos did not receive a mission until 1629, and it was used only sporadically until the construction of a larger church in 1661. However, abandonment of the pueblos occurred just a few years later between 1669 and 1676 due primarily to Apache raids in the surrounding area (Wade 2003: 75). Interestingly, Wade (2003), citing Scholes and Bloom (1945) as well as Fernandez Duro (1882), indicates that in 1629 a delegation of fifty Jumano visited the Catholic mission of San Antonio de Isleta (south of present-day Albuquerque, New Mexico), requesting baptism and a visit from the friars. According to these Jumano, severe drought conditions on the southern Plains had caused watering holes to dry up and the bison had vanished. Although, prior to 1629, previous requests by the Jumano were ignored, this visit resulted in at least two trips by friars to Jumano lands between 1629 and 1632. On their second trip in 1632, they traveled 200 leagues (520 miles) southeast from Santa Fe to a river they called the Nueces (generally recognized as the Concho River in Texas) and stayed in the Jumano lands for more than six months (Wade 2003: 72). It is during the middle seventeenth century that at least two large military expeditions with Catholic friars (the Castillo-Martín Expedition of 1650 and the Guadalajara Expedition of 1654) visited the Jumano on the western Edwards Plateau (Hickerson 1994: 110–111, Kenmotsu 2001: 28–29, Wade 2003: 74). During this period, the New Mexico colonists learned of the Tejas, a very large and populous nation of agriculturalists to the east. However, attempts to reach them failed due to the hostile alliance of three groups (the Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado) occupying lands between the Jumano and the Tejas (Wade 2003: 74). Nevertheless, the presence of enormous herds of bison, as well as freshwater pearls and numerous and willing converts, apparently proved incentive enough for the Spanish to maintain a period of sustained contact with the Jumano until approximately the time of the Pueblo Revolt in 1680 (Wade 2003). Later accounts of Jumano peoples also place them in rancherías at various locations along the Pecos, Concho, Rio Grande, and Colorado River drainages of Texas and in smaller groups ranging as far east as the Caddo country of East Texas and as far south as central Coahuila, Mexico (Kenmotsu 2001: 25). These Jumano are also described as hunters and gatherers, living in small bands; relying to a great extent on bison for food, shelter, and clothing; and occupying an area of unknown northern and southern boundaries along the Concho River and west along the Pecos River in Texas (Kenmotsu 2001: 24). 126

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Shortly after the Pueblo Revolt in 1680, the delegation of Jumano led by Juan Sabeata, who was then living in La Junta, visited El Paso and asked the Spanish government to visit their homeland along the Concho River (Kenmotsu 2001, Wade 2003). The Jumano also requested friars to perform baptisms and minister to the Christians among them, as well as Spanish families to colonize their lands. In addition, the Jumano sought protection from the Apache who were raiding Jumano rancherías with increasing frequency from the north (Kenmotsu 2001: 32, Wade 2003: 76). These requests resulted in the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition, led by a Catholic friar (Lopez) and a disenfranchised New Mexican colonist and military officer (Mendoza). In 1683, the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition proceeded southeast down the Rio Grande from El Paso to La Junta. They turned northeast and crossed West Texas to arrive at the Concho River, where they were welcomed by many Jumano (Wade 2003). This expedition represents the last of imperialsponsored incursions into West Texas expressly for the purpose of reconnoitering the Jumano homeland for settlement. The expedition spent several months at various locations in the Jumano lands, hunting and killing thousands of bison. Also, according to expedition diaries, Sabeata arranged a meeting between Jumano bands and several other cultural groups, including the “Tejas” from lands farther east (Kenmotsu 2001: 31, Wade 2003: 113–114). According to Wade’s analysis of the expedition diaries, a large camp was established somewhere in the vicinity of Menard, Texas, along the San Saba River, to await the arrival of more than thirty-five Native American groups, including the Tejas, summoned by Juan Sabeata (Wade 2003: 116). The expedition spent more than a month and a half at this location and constructed a fortified adobe tower in which numerous baptisms were performed and services were regularly held (Wade 2003: 116). Despite these positive signs, the expedition was plagued by Apache raids, and many of the indigenous groups, including the Tejas, failed to appear. In addition, infighting among various Spanish factions of the expedition began to spill over into relations between the Spanish and the assembled indigenous peoples (Kenmotsu 2001: 32, Wade 2003: 100–118). At about this time, Sabeata was either driven out or fled after repeated altercations with Mendoza over the Spanish officers’ failure to directly engage the Apache in combat, and the Spanish decided to return to El Paso (Wade 2003: 118). Shortly after leaving and proceeding west up the San Saba River, Mendoza named Captain Hernando Martín Serrano as the interpreter for the expedition (Wade 2003: 118). Wade suggests some Jumano must have remained with the expedition, thus necessitating a translator (Wade 2003: 119). However, another obvious reason was that the expedition was returning along 127

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a different route through unfamiliar country that, nonetheless, contained primarily Jumano speakers. In fact, it is well known that the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition did not precisely follow the same path on their return journey. Furthermore, the deviation from their original path is generally accepted to be somewhere between the Pecos River and the confluence of the Colorado and Concho Rivers. It also stands to reason that the expedition would not have returned along a route north of the Concho because the Apache controlled that area and Mendoza was obviously attempting to avoid them. The necessity of water for their mounts would likely have kept the Spanish on the San Saba River, the first major river drainage running east-west and immediately south of the Concho. At first glance, the Jumano appear to represent a bewildering array of contradictions. Although apparently broad-spectrum hunter-gatherers, who frequently focused on hunting bison, they were also closely associated with agriculturalists, often visiting and trading among various Pueblos as well as the Caddo. In fact, over a period of one hundred years, the Jumano ranged over virtually the entire state and parts of New Mexico and Mexico (Foster 1998, Kelley 1986, Kenmotsu 2001, Wade 2003). Although the intense social interaction and broad range is consistent with the ethnographic and archaeological model presented above, the Jumano suggest an almost hyper-extended example of broad-spectrum foragers maintaining a specific geographic territory. Even their ties with Pueblo groups changed as they were first documented as trading with the New Mexico Pueblos and later at least some individuals are found living in La Junta. However, a closer examination suggests that although the Jumano apparently ranged widely throughout the region and interacted with a number of different cultural groups, they possessed a well-defined as well as self-defined homeland or area, consistently interacted with agriculturalists—albeit in different areas—and maintained a remarkably consistent cultural identity (Kenmotsu 2001). For example, the Benavides Memorial of 1630, the Castillo-Martín Expedition in 1650, the Guadalajara Expedition in 1654, and the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition in 1683–1684 all place the Jumano homeland squarely in the northwestern portion of the Edwards Plateau of Central Texas. Furthermore, all these accounts mention the endemic hostility between the Jumano and the Apache to the north. In addition, the earliest accounts of the Jumano place them as far north as Santa Fe and as far south as Parral in Chihuahua, Mexico. However, over time this historic range, in conjunction with more frequent complaints from the Jumano concerning Apache depredations, gradually becomes more restricted. 128

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This sequence of events also corresponds well with the prehistoric distribution of arrow points in this region. For example, the frequency of Perdiz points drops off significantly north of the Concho River and drops off still more north of the Colorado and Brazos River drainages. Nonetheless, Perdiz points do occur in mixed contexts at several Garza sites (including residential bases, bison kills, and hunting camps) in the southern Texas Panhandle (e.g., 41FL1, 41FL17, 41CB27, 41GR56, 41TY2), and Garza points also occur in limited numbers in some northwestern Toyah components on the Edwards Plateau (41TG346 and 41ST87), suggesting contact and cohabitation between these two groups (Boyd 1997, Quigg and Peck 1995). However, virtually no Perdiz or Garza points are found in the upper or northern Panhandle, where a distinct material culture, Tierra Blanca, has been defined (Boyd 1997). Thus, the archaeological data suggest little or no contact between people occupying the northern and southern Texas Panhandle. Historically, the northern Texas Panhandle corresponds to the geographic range of the Querechos and the southern Texas Panhandle corresponds to the geographic range of the Teyas (Boyd 1997). Boyd (2001) summarizes and evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of the most commonly accepted ethnic model for two prehistoric complexes from the Late Prehistoric into the early Historic Period located in the Texas Panhandle north of the western Edwards Plateau. Drawing from the work of Judith Habicht-Mauche (1992), Boyd constructed the Querecho-Teya model (Q-T model) in which the historically known Querecho and Teya ethnic groups are linked to the archaeological remains of the Tierra Blanca and Garza Complexes. Not surprisingly, there are several Late Prehistoric and Protohistoric sites on the Southern Plains and in the Panhandle showing evidence of a bisonbased subsistence pattern and an exchange network with the eastern Pueblos (Boyd 1997). Bison provided an abundant source of food, as well as materials for tools, clothing, and shelter in this region. Painted Puebloan pottery and exotic goods, such as turquoise and Pecos pipes, are also commonly associated with residential Tierra Blanca sites and Garza sites (Boyd 1997: 452). With respect to endemic warfare between peoples in this region, there appears to be an easily discernable cultural boundary, evidenced by the absence of the distinctive basal-notched Garza arrow points north of the Red River drainage (Boyd 2001: 10), and it is important to note that Perdiz points are not found north of this boundary. In short, it is generally accepted that the Tierra Blanca Complex and the historically known Querechos were Apachean groups living on the Panhandle plains and trading with various northeastern Pueblo groups and that they 129

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were ethnically distinct from the Garza Complex and Teya people (Boyd 2001). However, as Boyd indicates, the ethnic identity of the Garza Complex/ Teya is not as certain. Although Garza points are an important diagnostic for the Garza Complex, and perhaps Teya groups, Perdiz points are also found, albeit in substantially fewer numbers, with Garza points across much of the southern Llano Estacado (Boyd 2001: 11). The presence of both point types in close association at the same sites suggests that Garza and Toyah peoples occupied the same area at the same time. There is some historical and archaeological evidence for Garza and Toyah peoples trading with more southerly pueblos, such as the Xumanas or Salinas Pueblos. Catholic friars documented annual visits to these pueblos by huntergatherers from the plains to the east. Archaeological evidence for this trade can be found in Chupadero Black-on-white sherds found in Garza and Toyah sites (Boyd 1997: 362). With respect to more northerly pueblos that may have first felt the brunt of the Athapaskan invasion, while Pecos Pueblo ceramics are found in Garza sites, there is little evidence for Pecos Pueblo ceramics among Toyah sites farther south. Kenmotsu (2001: 25) notes that, as early as 1599, the Apache complained to the Spanish of Jumano raids. This suggests that by A.D. 1599 Athapaskan peoples had moved south of Pecos Pueblo and were encroaching on the east/west Jumano trade routes to the Xumanas Pueblos. This would also explain the paucity of Pecos ceramics in Toyah sites. Boyd’s work emphasizes the complexity involved in understanding ethnic relationships on the Southern Plains during the Prehistoric and early Historic Periods. His work also suggests that although some ethnic groups, such as the Querecho or Apache, can be determined geographically, chronologically, historically, and archaeologically, others, such as the Teya, may not. Nevertheless, it is important when discussing cultural identity to acknowledge the tendency of people, past and present, European and Native American, to generalize. As indicated above, the terms “Querecho” and “Teya” may well have been relatively broad generic terms, almost certainly of Puebloan (also broadly generic) origin, applied to at least two distinct groups occupying the Southern Plains immediately east of the New Mexico Pueblos. Documentary evidence indicates that larger social aggregates were recognized by both Europeans and Native Americans. The Mexicanos (Nahuas) recognized by the Spanish grouped the numerous peoples inhabiting northern Mexico as Chichimecas (Flint and Flint 2005: 420). Therefore, it is possible the term “Teya” may have been applied generically to bands of both Garza and Toyah peoples. It also appears likely that as the Querechos pushed farther south, the persons in their path, represented archaeologically as Garza peoples, would 130

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have been forced south toward their prehistoric friends and allies, represented archaeologically by northwestern communities of Toyah sites. What is argued here is that these northwestern Toyah sites may have represented various Jumano communities or rancherías. Thus, it is possible that the occupation of the western Edwards Plateau by Jumano bands extends far back into the Prehistoric Period. The presence of Garza and particularly Perdiz points on the far northwestern Edwards Plateau may represent the shared occupation of this area for several hundred years, similar to the way Johnson (1994) envisions it. This conceptualization also presents some continuity between the Prehistoric and the Historic Periods with the inclusion of specific historic cultural identities, the Jumano and/or allies of the Jumano. In addition, this scenario supports the idea that the term “Teya” may have been a Puebloan corruption of the widely used term “Teja,” meaning friend or ally. As mentioned, the advance of the Athapaskan peoples south would have represented a significant disturbance to Jumano social relationships in the west. As both Kenmotsu (2001) and Wade (2003) note, Jumano relationships with sedentary groups along the periphery of the Southern Plains are reminiscent of symbiotic relationships between mobile foragers and sedentary agriculturalists around the world (Kelly 1995). Monica Parisii (1993–1998), an Argentine ethnohistorian, has documented similar arrangements among hunter-gatherer groups practicing bi-local residential patterns and sedentary agricultural groups during the early Spanish Colonial Period in Mendoza, Argentina. This arid to semi-arid region also represents a variable environmental situation and is prone to dramatic fluctuations in resource abundance. Building on the work of Donald Hardesty (1977), Parisii suggests that kin-based relationships created a permeable “social space,” which permitted individuals and groups access to a much broader and more diverse range of resources and territories than would have been possible under more socially restricted circumstances (Parisii 1993–1998: 149). To support this hypothesis, Parisii presents documentary evidence of Spanish court hearings held in the late sixteenth century in which foragers claimed the right to fish and gather wood in specific areas over a broad region. In each case, the plaintiff sought access to these areas on the grounds that one or both parents were from the said area (Parisii 1993–1998). Archaeologically, the idea of permeable social space maintained through the implementation of a broad behavioral baseline offers some explanation for instances of mixed artifacts such as Garza/Toyah sites containing Garza and Perdiz points. Historically, there is little question that the Jumano and other hunter-gatherer groups interacted across permeable social boundaries. 131

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But the historical documentation presented above also suggests that similar situations existed between the Jumano and some sedentary agriculture groups (i.e., the people of La Junta de los Rios and the Xumanas or Salinas Pueblos). It is likely that the reason the Jumano eventually abandoned their ties to the Pueblos in New Mexico was the growing depredations from the Apaches to their north and the increasingly unstable political situation in New Mexico. The Jumano may have then shifted the focus of their social interaction on their western frontier to agricultural groups located farther to the south. For example, the earliest historical sightings of the Jumano occurred along the Pecos River in the vicinity of Toyah Creek and in the pueblos of New Mexico, but scarcely one hundred years later, they were no longer occupying these areas and at least some Jumano were living at La Junta de los Rios. Nevertheless, they managed to maintain ties with Caddoan groups in East Texas for at least fifty years. By 1683, most of the groups in Central and West Texas had fallen prey to a combination of Spanish raids, European-introduced diseases, and Apache attacks. At this time, the Jumano, along with various other groups, occupied an area ranging from West Texas (La Junta de los Rios) to Central Texas (perhaps as far east as modern-day Brady). Despite almost one hundred years of interaction with the Spanish, the Jumano had not managed to gain their support against the Apache. It appears that the Jumano delegation to El Paso in 1683 represented a last-ditch effort to ally with the Spanish and gain military support against Apache incursions. Sabeata’s declaration clearly demonstrates the Jumano skill at negotiating trade and alliances with a wide array of groups and individuals, including the Spanish. In fact, it is difficult to find a European or Native American group, other than the Apache, that the Jumano either did not know or were not on good terms with in this region. These are precisely the qualities necessary for a group that occupies a large, diverse social field. In fact, the Jumano are discussed here in such detail because they appear to epitomize the type of forager group that would thrive in such a social field. Perhaps more importantly, they may have constituted the very backbone of such an organization. As Kelley (1955) pointed out, the documentation of Juan Sabeata’s journeys provides destinations and distances covered and, more importantly, hints at the numerous social ties the Jumano possessed. Sabeata was documented in El Paso, La Junta de los Rios, and along the Concho River in 1683 and 1684. In 1686, he was spotted among the Caddo of East Texas during the spring and summer, but returned to La Junta in the fall and wintered in Central or East Texas during 1687. Again in La Junta in 1688, Sabeata then returned to either Central or East Texas, because in 1689 132

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he was sighted on the Pecos en route to La Junta (Kelley 1955: 985). Once there, Sabeata set out for Parral in Chihuahua, Mexico, where he gave sworn testimony in Spanish court regarding the activities of the French in East Texas (Kelley 1955: 986). Spotted again among the Caddo of East Texas in 1690, he was later sighted in 1691 along the Guadalupe and Colorado Rivers in Central Texas, with the last known sighting of Sabeata occurring at Parral in 1692 (Kelley 1955: 987). The French too were aware of the Jumano, or the Choumay or Choman as they called them. In 1687, both Anastasius Douay, a French priest with the La Salle colony, and Henri Joutel refer to the Jumano in separate accounts as friends and allies of the Cenis (referred to by the Spanish as the Hasinai or Asinai) in East Texas. This is also substantiated in the documents pertaining to the interrogation of Pierre and Jean Talon, French-Canadian brothers and survivors of La Salle’s ill-fated colony: These Choman visit the Cenis and other nations quite often, not having war against anyone. They are neighbors of the Spaniards, but on a different side from the one by which the Talons passed. There are many among them who speak Spanish. (Answers to questions on the Memorial sent by Monsieg’. Pontchartrain 1698, translated by Bell 1987: 257)

The Cenis (Asinai), a Caddo group, lived along the western portion of the Caddo area and were known to visit and host visitors as well as to engage in trade and political alliances with several Central and West Texas groups, most notably the Jumano (Foster 1995, 1998; Hickerson 1994; Kelley 1955, 1986; Kenmotsu 2001; Wade 2003). Archaeologically, late Caddo period ceramics (Frankston Focus sherds—generally associated with the area in and around Anderson County) have been recovered in the La Junta District, one of the last and farthest west areas inhabited by the Jumano (Kelley 1986). In the early twentieth century, A. T. Jackson reported the excavation of a burial in Anderson County, East Texas, “which gave every indication of having been Asinai,” with the curious exception of a beveled knife and glass beads found beneath the skull (Ray 1935: 73). When various historical accounts are viewed together, a general impression begins to emerge that the Jumano were attempting to manipulate both the Spanish in the west and the French in the east and perhaps to pit the two against each other. There is little question that they practiced all manner of political intrigue. Douay referred to the Jumano as “ambassadors,” noting that they “expressed very naturally the ceremonies of the mass” and that they told him that “the Spaniards butchered the Indians cruelly, and, finally that if 133

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we would go with them, or give them guns, they could easily conquer them” (Kelley 1955: 988–989). Although this may reflect the rift in Jumano-Spanish relations following the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition, it may also simply indicate that the Jumano were telling the French exactly what they wanted to hear. The skilled diplomacy and intrigue practiced by the Jumano weighed strongly in their favor (Kenmotsu 2001). In fact, social skills and the ability to maintain friends and allies were, perhaps, the most highly valued skills among peoples participating in a large social field. This would hold particularly true for people living in areas most affected by fluctuations in the environment, such as the western Edwards Plateau. Thus, the need for friends and allies was probably felt most acutely by peoples like the Jumano, and the documentary evidence suggests they spent an inordinate amount of time focused on social relations. Joutel too noted that Native Americans in Texas often discussed their allies, and at least one Native American leader “often named the nations for me, their enemies as well as their allies” (Foster 1998: 246). But perhaps the most revealing statement concerning alliances and friendships among distinct cultural groups was written in August 1691 by Fray Francisco Casañas de Jesús María: I notice that this name Tejas includes all the friendly tribes. The name is common to all of them, even though their language may be different. And, since this name is a general term, it must be used for no other reason than to indicate the long-standing friendship which they entertain towards each other. And, therefore, among all these tribes “Tejias” means friends. These allied tribes do not have one person to govern them (as with us a kingdom is accustomed to have a ruler whom we call a king). They have only a xinesí. He usually has a subordinate who gathers together four or five tribes who consent to live together and to form a province or kingdom as it might be called—and a very large one, too, if all these tribes had one person to rule over them. But such a head they have not, and I, therefore, infer that this province which in New Spain is called “Tejias”— which really expresses just what they are, because each tribe is a friend to all the others cannot be called a kingdom. (Casañas, translated by Hatcher 1927: 286)

Casañas leaves little doubt that the term “Tejas” means “friend” or “ally,” and this account is immediately followed by a passage naming “the friendly tribes called the Tejias” and giving the general direction of these tribes and the distance they lived from the Asinai (Hatcher 1927: 286–287). It is here 134

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among the forty-eight named groups of the Tejas Alliance that the “Chuman” (Chouman/Jumano) are listed as one of several groups that “live south and west about eighty leagues from this province” (Hatcher 1927: 287). Thus, Casañas places eight groups of the Tejas Alliance, including the Jumano, as living in Central Texas. Many of the names on this list also correspond to those found on Joutel’s (Foster 1998: 246–247). In addition, Casañas provides a list of enemies—among them, the Apache. The proper name of the province is Asinai. It is composed of the nine tribes already named. There is not one tribe of these nine called Asinai but each of the tribes combined with the remaining eight compose the Asinai Nation. The friendly tribes called the “Tejias” are: Nazonis, Nacan, Nabaydacho, Nesta, Guaseo, Cataye, Neticatzi, Nasayaya, Naviti, Caxo, Dastones, Nadan, Tadivas, Nabeyxa, Nacoz, Caynigua, Caudadachos, Quizi, Natzoos, Nasitox, and Bidey. The five named last form a very large province to the northward, about fifty-five leagues from this province. The others listed live toward the north and east. The Guaza, Yaduza, Bata, Cojo, Datana, Chuman, Cagaya, and the Assenay—different from the Asinai—live toward the south and west about eighty leagues from this province. To say that the latter have become separated from the rest of the Asinai is a mistake. The Caquiza, Quintanuaha, Coai, Canu, Tiniba, Vidix, Sico, Toaha, Cautouhaona, and Nepayaya are located toward the southwest; the Canonidiba, Casiba, Dico, Xanna, Vinta, Tobo, Caquixadoquix, Canonizachitous, and Zanomi toward the southeast. All these I have named up to this point are allies. The enemies of the Province of the Asenay are the following: Anao, Tanico, Quibaya, Cauzeaux, Hauydix, Naviti, Nondacau, Quitxix, Zauanito, Tancaquaay, Canabatinu, Quiguayua, Diu-Juan, Sadammo. This is a very large nation. Others are called Apaches, Ca-au-cozi, and Mani. These are all enemies. Only three or four of these tribes are located toward the southeast; the others live toward the west. They communicate with the province of the Asinai, and they know that some are friends and some enemies. (Casañas, translated by Hatcher 1927: 286–287)

What is so remarkable about Casañas’s account is that he states so clearly and emphatically what the term “Tejas” means and to whom it applies. According to Casañas, the term “Tejas” refers to almost fifty distinct groups that are allied with one another “even though their language may be different” (Hatcher 1927: 286). At the end of this list of friendly groups, he even goes so far as to state: “All these I have named up to this point are allies,” indicating, once again, that the term “Tejas” means ally and is applicable to the 135

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entire province of Tejias (Hatcher 1927: 286). Thus, there is little doubt that the region of Tejias represented a broad social field consisting of numerous distinct groups that were all allies of Tejas. When combined, the documentary evidence for a broad “cultural baseline,” (see Wade 2001) consisting of friendship, alliances, close communication, and frequent visits among different cultural groups, is particularly forceful. These are also precisely the kinds of relationships necessary for maintaining a large social interaction sphere or field. In the past, archaeologists have tended to subsume these types of fields and networks under a strictly economic or ecological subheading as a reaction to environmental stimuli. The initial catalyst for developing such a field may have been environmental change at some point in the distant past, but, by the early Historic Period, at least one primary function of this vast network was to keep Native American groups across Texas abreast of various social, political, and economic developments (Kelley 1955: 988). For example, Joutel noted that in his travels to and from various villages in South and East Texas everyone seemed well aware of European movements and settlements in Texas, having already been informed of them by the Jumano. Trips stretching from La Junta de los Rios to the Caddo villages of East Texas were not regarded as particularly long and individuals frequently made side trips to collect news (Kelley 1955: 988). The traffic in news was “perhaps, more important culturally than the bison products, the salt, the bows and arrows, the turquoise and cotton, the feathers and shells, that made up the tangible currency of trade” (Kelley 1955: 981). For Kelley, these accounts, as well as the frequency of interaction among so many different groups, amounted to diffusion: And just as general accounts of the way of life of another group were transmitted by the activities of the Jumano and similar groups, so in all probability was technical information regarding such things as ceramic technology, artifact styles, and specific behavior patterns. (Kelley 1955: 989)

Although this type of interaction is particularly difficult to observe in the archaeological record, it does not necessarily demonstrate that a social field was not present. Indeed, based on the ethnographic data from huntergatherers in similar environmental settings, we should expect a social field to be present in this region and that what Casañas and others were describing during the early contact period was, in fact, a broad social field. It is also likely that the Tejas Alliance described during the early Historic 136

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fIgUre 5.4 Excerpt from Casañas document, Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin.

Period did not emerge overnight, representing instead some continuity with earlier pre–European contact Late Prehistoric II Period. In short, the Tejas alliance was present during late prehistory and is represented archaeologically as Toyah. Even the most conservative estimates date the Toyah interval between A.D. 1250 and 1650 ( Johnson 1994). By this estimate, more than one hundred years of the Toyah era (more than 25 percent) actually occurred during the period of early European contact. Therefore, Casañas’s description of the Tejas Alliance postdates Toyah by only forty years at most. However, some archaeologists are reluctant to view the Tejas Alliance as the historical extension or continuum of Toyah. Although they recognize Toyah as a material culture occupying a region similar to that of the Tejas Alliance immediately prior to the early Historic Period, they simply do not accept Casañas’s account as anything more than a large historic social field. They argue that although this document could be accepted as evidence for a large social field in 1691, one cannot extend the existence of a large social field back into prehistory—not even forty-one years. Nevertheless, a close read of the Casañas account does provide some evidence for the longevity of the Tejas Alliance. The most widely available translation of the Casañas account was published by Mattie Hatcher, a student of Herbert Eugene Bolton (considered by some to be the founder of Spanish borderland studies), in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly in 1927, now available online (see Hatcher 1927). In addition, a hand-written copy of the original Casañas document is archived in the Center for American History at the University of Texas at Austin (a portion is reproduced in Figure 5.4). The Center for American History document appears to be a precise copy of the text that Bolton examined and translated approximately a century ago at the Archivo General de la Nación (AGN) in Mexico City. Bolton included several translated passages from the AGN document in a book about the Hasinai that was published posthumously in 2002. The page numbers of the translated text from the AGN document, as well as the substance of 137

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the translation, correspond with the same passages found in the copy at the Center for American History. This suggests that it is an authentic copy or, at least, a very close copy of the Casañas account archived in Mexico City. Although both the Bolton (2002: 57) and Hatcher (1927: 286) translations are very similar to each other and retain the basic gist of the Casañas account, they are not precisely literal translations of the archived document. There are some differences and the one that figures most prominently in this discussion is the translation of this sentence from the Casañas document at the Center for American History in Austin, Texas: Hatcher’s translation of this sentence reads: And, since this name is a general term, it must be used for no other reason than to indicate the long-standing friendship which they entertain towards each other. (Hatcher 1927: 286)

Bolton’s translation reads: And, the reason why this name is common is no other than that of their long-standing friendship. (Bolton 2002: 57)

Although these translations communicate a relationship of sorts, denoted by the “general” or “common” term Texias, this relationship is defined as a “long-standing friendship” (Hatcher 1927: 286 and Bolton 2002: 57). A more literal and, arguably, precise translation of this passage is the following: And since this name is common, it is no more (or means no more) than an ancient/old pact of alliance that they have (among them).

The latter translation also infers that a seventeenth- century Catholic friar would use the Latin term “pax” in the literal sense of the word (e.g., “pax Romanus”). At any rate, Fray Casañas’s familiarity with Latin is not in question here, only whether his writing reflects this familiarity. Nonetheless, it is reasonable to suggest that Casañas’s phrase “la pax amistad antiqua” was intended to convey that Texias/Tejas represented “a pact of ancient alliance/ friendship.” It also seems reasonable to infer that Casañas’s use of the term “antiqua” (translated here as “ancient/old”) was intended to convey significant time depth, ostensibly a period of time greater than forty-one years. If this was indeed the case, then the pax Tejas described by Casañas in A.D. 1691 was extant during the Toyah interval. Although the precise meaning of a single phrase may seem insignificant, 138

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Casañas’s statement and document, combined with other historical accounts (i.e., Joutel and the Castillo-Martín, Guadalajara, and Mendoza-Lopez Expeditions), effectively span the thirty to forty-year gap inferred by some archaeologists between the prehistoric and historic records. Thus, a cursory dismissal of these data as multiple lines of evidence that contextualize this era more holistically is unwarranted and incautious and only impedes a more comprehensive grasp of social interaction, particularly with respect to social fields. Moreover, it is precisely these types of fields that provide the opportunity for groups and individuals to interact and define, maintain, and redefine identity. One reason for this reticence may lie in the perceived absence of a theoretical perspective that explicitly recognizes such networks and is capable of contextualizing and documenting them. Identity, as a theoretical framework, can recognize the fluid, flexible, and highly situational character of huntergatherer social interaction. A fundamental implication of Lesser’s (1961) work on social fields was that social relations within such fields, similar to social relations within the same social aggregates, “are patterned, not unstructured, adventitious, or incidental” (Lesser 1961: 43). He supported this statement by citing several examples of patterned social relations among American Indian, Australian, Melanesian, and African “primitives,” including intermarriage, visiting and travel, feuds and rights of asylum, war- and peace-making, and attendant capture and/or adoption (Lesser 1961). To this list, we may now add the Tejas, for the documentary evidence presented above clearly shows patterned social relations through the behavioral baselines described above (Wade 2001, Flint and Flint 2005, Kenmotsu 2001). The above documentary evidence also argues for the persistence of a large regional prehistoric Native American social field well into the Historic Period. However, a combination of events—including increasing pressure from Athapaskans to the north and European pressure from the south, east, and west, as well as disease—led to the apparent collapse of the Tejas social field and forced many Native Americans into Spanish missions in northern Coahuila and South and East Texas during the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. It was during this time that most stylistic variation in arrow point types began to fade. By approximately A.D. 1700, variation appears to have disappeared altogether, including among the most distinct arrow point types, primarily Alba, Clifton, Cuney, Garza, Harrell, Perdiz, Toyah (named after a town in far West Texas and generally not associated with Toyah components), and Washita. At about this same time, the Guerrero (or mission) point began to appear in the San Juan Bautista and San Bernardo missions near 139

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Guerrero, Coahuila, close to what are today the Texas/Mexico border cities of Eagle Pass and Piedras Negras (Inman 1997: 129–128, Ricklis 1999: 142). This point style, along with a plain, often bone- or sand-tempered, ceramic ware—known as mission ware—would soon spread throughout most of the southern and eastern portions of the former Tejas social field. The Perdiz arrow point is known for its ubiquitous presence throughout Texas, and this distribution also corresponds to the later Tejas social field. However, Perdiz points have not been observed in good archaeological context with historic artifacts, prompting some ( Johnson 1994) to suggest that the Perdiz point, despite its ubiquity in the prehistoric record, was discontinued just prior to the dawn of the Historic Period. Nevertheless, the prehistoric distribution also corresponds with the historic boundaries of specific historic cultural groups, such as the Jumano, the Caddo, and various other groups, documented as members of the Tejas Alliance. What is argued here, and will be discussed further in Chapter 6, is that the widespread distribution of the Perdiz point may have marked the boundaries of the Tejas Alliance in prehistory, recognized archaeologically as Toyah, but that by the time of the Tejas collapse, many of the surviving Native Americans were already using firearms or had entered missions. The result was that the overall numbers of Perdiz points deposited in historic contexts would have been extremely low. But, if this was the case, might archaeologists expect to see some continuation of the Perdiz point style into the Historic Period? In fact, Mallouf (2004) and Walters and Rogers (1975) have documented metal arrow points in the Trans-Pecos area and, although metal points are generally noteworthy, these particular points were wrought into shapes resembling Perdiz arrow points (Figure 5.5). The metal points documented by Mallouf (2004) were found on the Marfa Plain and those documented by Walters and Rogers (1975) were recovered along the Pecos River in Crockett County, all within the former distributional range of the prehistoric Perdiz point. Interestingly, the shape of the Perdiz-like metal points is quite different from various examples of commercially available or trade points, suggesting a significant intent or that certainly a considerable effort was made to achieve a specific shape. Farther east, along the southeastern margins of the Balcones Escarpment, a Perdiz arrow point made of vitreous glass was recovered from the San Antonio de Valero mission in San Antonio, Texas (Lohse 1999: 268). Kay Hindes, San Antonio City archeologist, also states that glass Perdiz points of unknown context were observed in collections at the Witte Museum in San Antonio (Hindes, personal communication 2005). Thus, these metal and glass arrow points, wrought from foreign materials into the familiar form of 140

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fIgUre 5.5 Perdiz and metal arrow points from the Trans-Pecos (after Mallouf 2004: Figure 1).

the Perdiz point, may represent an attempt by Native Americans to maintain continuity with the indigenous past by incorporating an iconic form of the Tejas Alliance into European materials. Furthermore, the disappearance of the Perdiz arrow point form and the almost simultaneous emergence of the Guerrero point among Native Americans within the Spanish mission system suggest the persistence of a similar practice. In short, a specific point style 141

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may have been adopted by various cultural groups to reflect their participation in a broader social arena and, thus, their shared identity within the same social field. This chapter presents a historical context for Central and South Texas spanning approximately 175 years, beginning in A.D. 1528 and ending in A.D. 1700. The documentary evidence for this period indicates that many huntergatherer bands who spoke the same language frequently intermarried. In addition, these bands often inhabited large seasonal camps, known historically in Spanish as rancherías, matching ethnographic and archaeological descriptions of residential base camps. Although there is little information concerning specific community ranges, bands who spoke the same language were documented as occupying specific geographically circumscribed areas, which strongly suggests endogamous marriage/linguistic groups. Individuals, as well as bands, were also known to participate in long- distance social networks often spanning most of Central and South Texas. In short, the historical accounts tend to support a model for numerous and diverse hunter-gatherer cultural identities throughout the region. Geographically, the locations for many of these culture groups appear to correspond to specific areas and in some cases, such as the Jumano, these areas were even identified as homelands. In addition, several larger and/or better represented groups—including the Teyas, Jumano, and even some agriculturalists (the Hasinai Caddo) and fisher folk (the Karankawa)—were divided into smaller units consisting of several distinct communities. These communities were represented primarily by residential base camps (and several other special function sites within a specific territory or range in the case of hunter-gatherers) and villages (in the case of agriculturalists and the annual aggregation points for the Karankawa), often referred to as rancherías by the Spanish chroniclers. Early historical accounts also document an extensive exchange network and political alliance, Tejas, which existed for at least 175 years during the Historic Period and spanned most of Central, South, and East Texas. More than fifty Native American groups were documented as participating in the Tejas Alliance during the latter half of the seventeenth century, and many of these identities persisted despite the essentially transformative character of identity and the political, economic, and social upheavals that occurred during this time. As the scale of social interaction and the number of groups involved increased, so too did investment in reinforcing or stabilizing behavioral expectations used to facilitate various types of interactions (e.g., social, political, and economic) between distinct cultural identities. This strongly suggests that 142

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the widespread Tejas Alliance documented during the early Historic Period also represented a social field of considerable time depth. Chapter 6 presents a synthesis of prehistoric archaeological data from the same region and investigates the time depth of cultural identities and social interactions represented by the Tejas Alliance/social field.

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his chapter presents a regional overview of approximately twenty-five hundred years of Texas prehistory in order to provide a contextual basis for Toyah material culture and the cultures from which it emerged. Obviously, such a span of time cannot be summarized without making some broad generalizations, and this synthesis is no exception. Moreover, the archaeology of this region was defined largely on the basis of archaeologists’ perceptions that similar types of material culture appear to be concentrated in specific areas during certain periods of time. This is entirely consistent with the process of identity construction, as well as with archaeological method and theory in general—which is to say that if it is not always precisely correct, it does follow its own very human logic. Thus, this chapter begins by contextualizing how archaeologists perceive this region.

IntrodUCtIon to the arChaeoLogy of texas Anthropologists and archaeologists have long recognized that Texas, located between several large culture areas (including the Plains cultures to the north, the Southeastern United States culture area, the Southwestern culture area of the United States, and the Mexican culture area to the south), was once home to a uniquely and “tenaciously conservative” prehistoric population of hunter-gatherers ( Jelks 1978). Early historical accounts and subsequent archaeological investigations indicate a hunter-gatherer mode of existence for most areas of Texas since the end of the Pleistocene (Collins 1995, Hall 1998, Hester 1995, Jelks 1978, Ricklis 1995). As Jelks (1978) points out, the long duration of a hunting and gathering lifestyle, so different from our own, led several academics to refer to this region in decidedly derogatory terms, including “cultural sink” (Swanton 1924), “cultural sump” (Kroeber 1939), and “ethnographic sink” (Sjoberg 1953: 280).

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Besides distasteful, these characterizations are implicitly biased in their assumption that culture change and complexity, such as that exhibited by sedentary agriculturalists, are indications of a logical progression of cultural development—which they are not. Contemporary society holds that change and the ability to adapt are, more or less, admirable qualities. However, perhaps the best test of any specific adaptation is the length of time it is useful. Thus, the enduring subsistence regime for thousands of years in Central and South Texas appears to be broad-spectrum foraging, suggesting an extremely suitable and well-developed adaptation. One may well ask why it was necessary for populations surrounding Central and South Texas to change their subsistence and settlement patterns from foraging to farming. In fact, hunting and gathering persisted in some regions of the world for millennia and is increasingly recognized as an efficient and often elegantly complex adaptation to variable environments (Binford 1983, Lee 1979, Lightfoot 1983, Yellen 1977). Previous notions of hunter-gatherers as gastronomically and materially impoverished nomads wandering across trackless wilderness in a state of cultural fugue are now considered grossly inaccurate (Kelly 1995). In most cases, areas that supported generations of prehistoric foragers cannot sustain modern populations without petroleum-based farming and/ or ranching. This is particularly true in many parts of Texas. Hunting and gathering was, and may still be, the most reliable long-term subsistence strategy for humans in this region. Given the longstanding tradition of hunting and gathering in Texas and the outstanding preservation qualities of stone tools, cultural chronologies in Texas are based primarily on “changes in projectile point morphology as indicators of temporal periodicity and geographic distribution” (Prewitt 1981: 65). As Prewitt concedes, this is not the most desirable situation. But, in the absence of other suitable diagnostics—ceramics did not become widespread in Texas until sometime after A.D. 1200 (Perttula et al. 1995)—durable, distinctive, and abundant stone projectile points recovered from hundreds of stratified sites over many years have proven a reliable, if broad, relative dating technique for approximately ten thousand years of prehistory ( Jelks 1978, Prewitt 1981). However, differences in the temporal and spatial distribution of projectile points, as well as other artifact classes and technological innovations, led to a number of chronologies, each specific to different areas of the state. Turner and Hester (1993: 50–63) present no fewer than seven cultural chronologies, and more chronologies are found elsewhere (Aten 1983, Hall et al. 1986, Hester 1980, Hughes 1991, Lynott 1981, McGregor and Bruseth 1987, Mallouf 1981, Ricklis and Cox 1991, Prewitt 1983, Shafer 1986, Story 1990, 145

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Whalen 1981). For a succinct historical review of cultural classification systems in Texas, see Treece and Lintz (1993: 388–391). Several revisions and refinements have been proposed ( Johnson 1986, Johnson and Goode 1994, Ricklis and Collins 1994), but, as Collins (1995: 371) states, “[t]he work of verifying and improving the regional archeological chronology will always remain unfinished.” Nevertheless, three broad periods or stages have been defined based primarily on region-wide changes in projectile points: Paleo-Indian, Archaic, and Late Prehistoric or Neoarchaic. These, in turn, are generally subdivided into the Paleo-Indian Period; Early, Middle, and Late Archaic Periods; and Late Prehistoric I Period (Austin Phase) and Late Prehistoric II Period (Toyah Phase). For example, stemmed Early Archaic dart points replaced fluted and unfluted Paleo-Indian points, and stemmed dart points diminished in size during the Late Archaic and were eventually replaced with smaller true “arrowhead” points during the Austin Phase of the Late Prehistoric. The variation observed in chronologies from one area to the next no doubt reflects the fluid, situational, and dynamic character of hunter-gatherer social interaction in a variable environmental region. But this plethora of chronologies can become problematic when a study area straddles spatial boundaries between two or more different chronologies. For example, Nickels et al. (2003: 11–12) found that since the 1960s, archaeologists have proposed more than half a dozen different chronologies for a single project area overlapping three such boundaries. Fortunately, Nickels and his colleagues refrained from adding yet another chronology to the mix. In the interest of brevity, chronology is generally discussed here in broad terms such as the Late Archaic, the Late Prehistoric I, and the Late Prehistoric II, each encompassing relatively large (several hundred years) blocks of time. Occasionally, corrected absolute dates from specific sites are presented in order to discuss blocks of time with greater precision. In fact, some archaeologists (Boyd 1997, Hall 1998, Mauldin et al. 2003, Ricklis 1995) have begun to use absolute dates in place of a chronology. This approach to culture change emphasizes the evolution of cultural material in well-stratified intrasite components as well as intersite comparisons of components across large geographic areas combined with settlement and subsistence patterns and paleoenvironmental studies. However, as we shall see, it is only now that archaeologists are beginning to understand how these processes were set in motion several thousand years ago.

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Changes In LatItUdes, Changes In attItUdes: theoretICaL shIfts In the PeoPLIng of the amerICas and PaLeo- IndIan and arChaIC PeoPLes A number of archaeological discoveries in North, Central, and South America during the latter half of the twentieth century had a significant impact on theories concerning the peopling of the Americas and archaeologists’ perceptions of prehistoric hunter-gatherers. In general, these findings indicate that hunter-gatherers settled the Americas far earlier, practiced a more diverse subsistence pattern, and were more technologically and socially sophisticated than was previously thought. Although many of these discoveries did not occur in Texas, they are applicable to the archaeological record of Texas. When the Americas were first settled, the world was locked in the latter portion of the last ice age (Pleistocene Epoch). Vast portions of the earth lay under thousands of feet of ice, and the water locked in this ice resulted in sea levels between 100 and 135 meters (325 and 440 feet) lower than modern levels. Lower sea levels resulted in very different coastlines than those we see today, and sizable areas of dry land were exposed for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. This was the case in many areas around the world, even in the Gulf of Mexico and along the Texas coast. The New and Old Worlds come closest together between Siberia and Alaska at the Bering Strait and it was here, during the last ice age, that the sea retreated, exposing a strip of land that bridged the two continents and provided a possible route for humans to enter the Americas. In fact, the concept of entry at this location is not new. A Jesuit missionary named Joseph de Acosta proposed this idea as early as 1591, just 99 years after Columbus bumped into the Americas (Huddleston 1967). For many years, theories concerning how people entered the Americas relied heavily on the existence of this ice age land bridge (Beringia). However, it was also noted that the ice sheets covering North America represented significant obstacles. In order to enter warmer areas to the south by land, ice age peoples would first have to traverse barriers of ice one mile high and covering thousands of square miles. Nevertheless, scientists presented evidence for a narrow ice-free corridor in the western interior of Canada during some portions of the Pleistocene. In short, nomadic hunters followed game herds across Beringia into northwest Canada where they traveled south via an interior ice-free corridor, eventually reaching warmer regions in North America and beyond. Based on radiocarbon dates from the earliest human occupations in North America, these first Americans were thought to have arrived sometime be147

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tween twelve thousand and ten thousand years ago. The earliest Paleo-Indian sites in North America also yielded similar tool kits and the same projectile point (dubbed the “Clovis point”) distributed over a remarkably broad area. “Clovis-first” advocates interpreted the lithic assemblage as a technological adaptation to big game hunting, and its broad distribution over such a large area suggested nothing less than a migration of people from Asia to North America. The reader may recall similar conclusions concerning Toyah peoples. By the mid- 1970s, some archaeologists (Fladmark 1975, 1979) began to question the ice-free corridor route into the Americas. This route seemed rather unappealing for a number of reasons. To begin, areas immediately adjacent to continental glaciers would have been free of most plant life and, thus, less than inviting to most herbivores. In addition, people tended to populate rich coastal areas first and then moved upstream along similarly productive river valleys into continental interiors. Furthermore, it is reasonable to infer, based on the peopling of Japan and Australia tens of thousands of years earlier, that some East Asian peoples possessed at least rudimentary nautical experience with kayaks and canoes. To reasonably adept mariners, the northwest coast, filled with abundant and familiar marine resources, would have presented a far easier and considerably shorter route to warmer and more hospitable regions farther south. As debate over the ice-free corridor increased, the site of Monte Verde was discovered in 1976 at the other end of the Americas in southern Chile. Monte Verde consisted of several prehistoric occupation zones sealed in a peat bog alongside a small stream. One of these occupation zones turned out to be a well-preserved residential campsite, more than 12,000 years old, that contained the remains of living structures (complete with foundation timbers, posts, and stakes with knotted string fiber still attached), a child’s footprint, numerous wooden and stone tools, forty-two edible species of plants, and several animal remains (including mastodon, an extinct relative of elephants and mammoths) (Dillehay 1997). Nor did this site represent an ephemeral occupation. In fact, the structure foundation and varied botanical assemblage indicated year-round occupation (Dillehay 1997). The discovery of Monte Verde raised a number of issues with prevailing theories of the peopling of the Americas in general and Paleo-Indians in particular. For example, Monte Verde was approximately fourteen thousand years old and inconveniently located at the opposite end of the Americas— a long way from the Bering Strait. This most southerly of Paleo-Indian sites was more than a thousand years older than any previously discovered PaleoIndian sites in North America. Moreover, the abundance and diversity of 148

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botanical remains, along with rather substantial residential foundations, was also inconsistent with ideas of Paleo-Indians as strictly nomadic big game hunters. There were also indications of far older occupations at Monte Verde, perhaps more than thirty thousand years old. The discovery and documentation of Monte Verde resulted in a widespread reexamination of archaeology in the Americas and of our conceptualization of hunter-gatherers in general. The theory that ancient mariners peopled the Americas was also revisited and it soon became clear that the harsh conditions of interior routes could have been avoided altogether by simply following the southern coast of Beringia and the west coast of North America in canoes and kayaks (Dillehay 2000). Pleistocene age deposits in caves along the Alaskan coast also revealed abundant terrestrial flora and fauna (including bears), indicating that this area was not only ice-free, but also capable of supporting large omnivores (e.g., bears and humans) during the last ice age. Moreover, archaeological evidence from Australia and Indonesia indicates that people made their way to the Australian mainland by island hopping across the Indonesian archipelago in small watercraft as early as forty thousand years ago (Bowler et al. 2003). Although islands in this archipelago are often within view of each other, there are several areas where the closest landmass is not visible. Therefore, even when sea levels were at their lowest during the Pleistocene, early mariners would have had to cross at least 43 to 54 miles (70 to 87 kilometers) of open water. Such distances, even on a clear and calm sea, are far beyond the maximum line of sight for the unaided human eye. Nor were these shallow seas. In one stretch, well beyond sight of land, it was necessary to cross the Wallace Trench, which today reaches depths of 25,000 feet (7,500 meters) (Feder 2007: 260). This suggests that by the time humans began peopling the Americas, they were adept at a number of skills, including navigating large stretches of open water in small vessels. Although it may be true that plants and animals were being domesticated in Mesopotamia at the same time some people in North America were hunting mammoths, the people who first colonized the New World should not be conceptualized as primitive nomads wandering in an endless search for big game. A more careful consideration suggests superior adaptive abilities and technological sophistication that could be applied in a number of different environmental settings. Although never covered in glaciers or large ice sheets, Texas experienced significant environmental changes at the end of the Pleistocene that continued, to some extent, during portions of the following geological period, the Holocene. The character, extent, and complexity of environmental factors 149

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fIgUre 6.1 Pleistocene coastline of the Gulf of Mexico eighteen thousand years ago (USEPA 2007).

also triggered various changes in human societies. For example, Hall points to Pleistocene sea levels as much as 100 meters lower than today’s sea level, resulting in steeper regional gradients for Texas rivers and a coastline that was 65 to 160 kilometers more seaward than present day (Figure 6.1). Wetter climatic conditions during the Pleistocene also meant that river catchment basins received considerably more water and, combined with the steeper grade, resulted in more deeply incised and straighter river channels across most of the region (Hall 1998: 1). Warmer temperatures at the end of the Pleistocene resulted in the melting of continental ice sheets and the inundation of coastal river valleys by approximately 9000 B.C. However, sea levels did not stabilize to present conditions until approximately three thousand years ago (Ricklis 1995: 267–268). As sea levels rose, river gradients decreased, and climatic conditions became more arid. The flow of water in rivers decreased in velocity and increased in sediment, and the clear, deep, and fast rivers of the Pleistocene began to fill with alluvium and transformed themselves into the broad meandering river valleys of the modern Texas coastal plain (Hall 1998: 1). The increased sediment also resulted in the creation of the modern Texas coastline with its con150

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tinuous chain of barrier islands, sheltered lagoons, and estuaries providing the necessary spawning and nursery habitats to support large fisheries of black drum and red snapper. Although the catalyst for change at the end of the Pleistocene was an abrupt onset of global warming, changes associated with this event continued to occur for several millennia and so too did post–Pleistocene adaptations. For example, as the sea level in the Gulf of Mexico stabilized approximately three thousand years ago, modern estuarine biotic communities became established by about 2500–2000 B.P. These environmental changes played a significant role in the development of human settlement and subsistence patterns on the coast (Ricklis 1995: 280). For example, Ricklis correlated multiple radiocarbon assays from several archaeological sites along the Central and Lower Texas coast with periodic increases in the oyster shell and fish otoliths related to sea stillstands. These data indicate that each time sea levels stabilized long enough for estuarine biotic communities to form, people established campsites along the coastline and began exploiting these resources (Ricklis 1995: 269–279). Hall (1998), as well as others (Black 1989, Collins 1995, Hester 1995), posit similar, if later, scenarios farther inland, where subsistence focused on dense botanical, faunal, and aquatic resource “patches” (Hall 1998: 4–5). These patterns are also consistent with Willey and Phillips’s (1958: 107–108) conceptualization of the Archaic as a time when hunter-gatherers became less mobile, but their subsistence patterns became more diversified following the Pleistocene. However, there is some evidence that these changes may have occurred much earlier in some portions of Texas, perhaps as early as the Paleo-Indian Period (Collins 1998: 289, Collins 1995: 381–382, Collins et al. 1993, Masson and Collins 1995). In fact, many aspects of the Paleo-Indian and Early Archaic Periods in Texas are poorly understood and are beginning to be reexamined. Recent excavations conducted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at the Buckeye Knoll Site revealed one of the largest Early Archaic cemeteries in North America (Ricklis and Doran 2003). Approximately eighty burials were excavated and radiocarbon assays date this cemetery between seventy-five hundred and sixty-three hundred years old. Analysis of human remains showed that several individuals were approximately seventy years of age—far older than prehistoric hunter-gatherers were previously thought to have lived. Archaeologists estimate that only about 25–30 percent of the Early Archaic cemetery has been excavated, but this sample represents approximately 10 percent of all burials in North America dating to this period (Ricklis and Doran 2003). 151

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This cemetery is also remarkable for the variety, sophistication, and unique character of grave goods, including projectile points, ground banner stones, and quartzite sinkers or plummets. The groundstone objects are generally associated with Early Archaic cultures in the Mississippi River Valley and the Southeastern United States. The combination of age, size, and presence of artifacts once thought to be exotic to Texas suggests an entirely unknown culture. Project director Robert Ricklis noted during an interview: “We did not know this culture existed. Period.” (Tewes 2006: 1A). The recent discovery of a large, previously unknown early prehistoric culture in Texas with obvious ties to the American Southeast indicates that archaeologists’ knowledge of Texas prehistory, particularly early prehistory, is far from complete. Although regional climatic stability was achieved at various intervals between the Paleo-Indian and the Late Archaic Periods, this era spans significant climatic variation prior to the onset of modern conditions (now in the process of changing once again). During this transition, plant and animal densities, species, and ranges fluctuated considerably and, in some cases, disappeared completely. These changes were certainly significant enough to affect Paleo-Indian and Early and Middle Archaic subsistence and settlement patterns—particularly with respect to site locations, making them different from those of the Late Prehistoric and Late Archaic Periods. Sites containing components spanning the entire archaeological record are rare in Texas and tend to be found in specific geographic settings, such as an ecotone, where one or more ecological communities and/or biotic provinces meet, forming a particularly rich environmental niche. These sites are also frequently located on or near perennial water sources. When short-term variations in weather patterns occur, foragers can take advantage of whatever ecological niche happens to have the most abundant resources at the time. During long-term climatic change, the presence of several different species in the same location offers greater potential for producing viable long-term adaptations than a single ecological community. Thus, the combination of reliable water and biodiversity surrounding these types of site locations offers a distinct buffering advantage for plants, animals, and humans in the face of significant environmental change. Nevertheless, despite these changes at least one archaeological feature, burned rock middens, is present at many sites in Texas during all periods, spanning approximately nine thousand years (Black et al. 1997). One might infer that the use of this feature through all periods implies little change in local environmental conditions. However, the widespread distribution of this technology in time and space, combined with a variety of botanical remains recovered in burned rock middens, indicates a primary adaptation to 152

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a specific resource category, geophytes and roots, rather than a specific local species. Paleoenvironmental data for the region as a whole is extremely limited and poorly understood. In addition, Texas is a vast, diverse region and achieving any degree of precision with respect to paleoenvironmental reconstructions involves complex modeling. In the interest of brevity, this book addresses these data and the conclusions that can be drawn from them in very broad terms. But there is little question that the end of the Pleistocene set tremendous climatic changes in motion and that, in general, this event continued to have significant and long-term implications for plants, animals, and humans.

Late arChaIC orIgIns of the Late PrehIstorIC hUnter- gatherer tradItIon The stabilization of key environmental factors (climate, hydrology, and geomorphology) and the corresponding development of biotic communities sometime during the late Middle Archaic and/or early Late Archaic Periods permitted plants and animals to establish ecological niches throughout Texas. The same has also been said for human populations during the Late Archaic (Prewitt 1983). For example, a corresponding rise in the number and size of archaeological sites, as well as the discovery of several large Late Archaic cemeteries, on the Gulf Coastal Plain all suggest that large coastal fisheries provided the impetus for population growth during the Late Archaic Period. According to Ricklis and Weinstein: After sea-level reached its current elevation at circa 3000 B.P. an essentially modern, highly productive, estuarine environment formed. Larger more abundant archaeological sites during this period suggest growing coastal populations that relied increasingly on fishing. (Ricklis and Weinstein 2005: 108)

Some (Hall 1998; Hall et al. 1986; Hester 1981, 1995; Ricklis 1995; Story 1990) also suggest that cemeteries signal well-defined group territories, which may be viewed as a “systemic response” to increased regional population density (Ricklis 1995: 283). However, the discovery of the Early Archaic cemetery at Buckeye Knoll suggests that the emergence of group territories defined by large cemeteries happened at least twice in prehistory. Moreover, if large cemeteries are, in fact, systemic responses to increased regional population density, then the 153

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threshold for regional population density resulting in large cemeteries was reached at least twice in the same area of Texas over a period spanning more than three thousand years. Nor can this aspect of population density in Texas prehistory be defined by linear cultural evolution that began in the Late Archaic Period. Moving inland, the broad river valleys of the coastal plain and river terraces of the Edwards Plateau support the densest stands of native pecan trees in the world (Hall 1998: 4, 2000). At 70 percent fat, pecans represent an important source of essential fatty acids, which are a critical dietary component for foragers (Hall 2000: 110). However, the productivity of mast resources in general and pecans in particular varies and, thus, a bumper crop one year may be followed by relative scarcity the next (Hall 1998: 4–5). Nevertheless, given the nutritional value of nuts and hunter-gatherers’ reliance on mast resources documented by ethnographers, it seems likely that pecans were a significant prehistoric resource in Texas. Hall (1998: 2–3) also points to the late Holocene river valleys of the coastal plain where seasonal overbank flooding deposited numerous species of turtles and fish, which were then trapped by receding waters in floodplain features such as sloughs, oxbow lakes, and backwater swamps. These features may have been the prehistoric equivalent of “catfish farms,” permitting people to occupy sites for several weeks or months (Hall 1998: 2–3). Hall also correlates the appearance of large cemeteries in this area during the Late Archaic with marked population growth and territoriality (1998). Although Hall’s early work (Hall 1985, Hall et al. 1986) linked cemeteries and pecan groves, his later work focuses on the dense, fixed, and complementary nature of both mast and aquatic seasonal resources contributing to population growth during the Late Archaic Period. Farther south and west in the more arid mesquite savanna of South Texas, subsistence and settlement patterns also focused on specific, but varied, resources (Hester 1981). Cutting through the mixed brush-grasslands dotted by stands of live oak and mesquite, rivers such as the Nueces, Frio, and Rio Grande represented “high density resource areas” in which medium and small game, as well as numerous plant resources, were concentrated in microenvironments (Hester 1981: 120). Low-density resource areas in the less watered uplands lying between riparian zones generally represented much less abundant and desirable fare. Important exceptions to this pattern were the occasional appearance of bison herds on the savanna and the annual ripening of prickly pear cactus fruit. Prickly pear cacti produce an abundant fruit, or tuna, similar to figs once a year, generally in the late summer. Some of the earliest historical 154

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accounts document the significance of this resource to indigenous peoples (Hall 1998, Hester 1981, 1995). Cabeza de Vaca commented that hundreds of Native Americans gathered in the dense prickly pear patches of South Texas and held dances and consumed large quantities of prickly pear tunas. Numerous historical accounts also reflect seasonal aggregations in this area to harvest tunas during late summer and early fall and to hunt bison during the winter and spring (Foster 1995, Hickerson 1994, Wade 2003). In terms of the material culture, Hester (2005: 260) recognizes some temporal and spatial variation in the distribution of dart point styles in South Texas during the Late Archaic Period. The earliest dart point styles that occur in northern portions of South Texas are represented by Marcos, Montell, and Castroville; the later Transitional Late Archaic in this area is represented by smaller, side-notched Ensor, Frio, and Fairland dart points (Hester 2005: 260). Farther south, the number of stemmed points decreases significantly and both the Late and Transitional Archaic are represented primarily by small triangular and convex-based dart points (Catan, Desmuke, and Matamoros) (Hester 2005: 260). This distributional pattern may reflect different spheres of social interaction with the dart point styles, chronology, and distribution in the northern portions of South Texas corresponding with those of southern Central Texas and the southern portion of South Texas, reflecting similarities with northern Mexico along the Rio Grande Plain. At least some connection with areas to the north is indicated by the presence of specific types of artifacts, primarily large bifaces from the Edwards Plateau, in South Texas funerary contexts (Hester 2005: 268–273). According to Hester, some of these artifacts fluoresce orange when exposed to ultraviolet light, an indication that this lithic material is Edwards Plateau chert. In addition, the presence of obsidian, albeit in very small amounts, from New Mexico, Wyoming, and Idaho at some sites in South Texas also suggests significant long-distance transport and/or interaction networks. Hester, relying primarily on the data from the Lino Site (41WB437), one of the most intensively excavated and better preserved sites in South Texas, suggests Late Archaic campsites may have been characterized by “shortterm, multi-family, occupations utilizing plant and animal resources that are present in the area today” (2005: 266). Seasonality and site structure data are also presented, indicating the time of year and approximate numbers of individuals occupying residential base camps in these communities (Hester 2005: 266). In general, Hester’s (2005) synthesis of the Late Archaic Period in South Texas suggests local variation in diet consistent with small bands/communities of broad-spectrum foragers occupying specific territories or ranges. Nevertheless, southern portions of this area appear to have been oriented 155

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with northern Mexico, whereas northern portions of South Texas were interacting with the peoples of Central Texas living on the Edwards Plateau. The rolling oak savannas of the Edwards Plateau in Central Texas offered abundant and diverse resources during the Late Archaic Period. In addition to mast resources (primarily pecans and acorns), Central Texas contains perhaps the highest density of white-tailed deer in North America, and open savannas scattered among the oak-mesquite-juniper parks provided short-grass pasture for the intermittent presence of bison and antelope (Collins 1995). But the hallmark of Central Texas archaeology is the burned rock accumulations or midden features representing plant baking. The thermal retention properties of heated stone were recognized thousands of years earlier for their ability to render edible the bulbs of otherwise indigestible geophytes, such as sotol, agave lechuguilla, camas, and wild garlic and onions (Dering 1999, Thoms 1989). Burned rock middens represent the cumulative efforts of generations of people returning to the same area to gather specific types of plants, build rock oven features, and then cook the plants in those features. The development of burned rock middens is intimately tied to local plant communities, indicating the significance of these resources in determining subsistence and settlement patterns in specific areas and for specific times. In fact, thousands of prehistoric sites in Texas contain burned rock middens. Many also contain small isolated burned rocks and ash concentrations (including sites with burned rock middens). Small features are likely indicative of individual or family warming or cooking hearths, similar to those found among twentieth- century foragers. Alternatively, burned rock middens, sometimes several meters in diameter and more than a meter in height, reveal dense accumulations of fire-cracked rock, charcoal, and ash, with internal features or basins composed of tabular rock. Burned rock middens then represent a cumulative, specialized, and different feature from warming hearths (Black et al. 1997). Experiments conducted by archaeologists since the late 1980s also revealed that rock-lined pits, when sufficiently heated, will retain and focus enough heat to bake the toxins from several species of geophytes (Black et al. 1997). However, the rock used in these thermal features must be of sufficient size to efficiently absorb and retain heat for cooking, and when rock (particularly limestone) is heated, it fractures. Specific plant species tend to grow in specific locations, thus, it is likely that people would return to the same location to harvest and process the same plants. At each cooking episode, some rock fractured and would eventually be replaced, resulting in ever-greater accumulations of fire-cracked rock. 156

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Ethnographic accounts document rock cooking features in residential base camps, including small warming or cooking hearths and large communal baking or roasting pits used for processing plant foods. Prehistoric residential bases reflect a similar pattern, including a number of different activities and the processing of both plants and animals consistent with broad-spectrum foraging. Large burned rock midden sites, on the other hand, often exhibit a specific focus on plant resources and thus may be viewed to a greater or lesser extent as specialized sites (Black et al. 1997, Thoms 2008). Although burned rock middens occur in residential base campsites, they are increasingly viewed as specialized features geared toward plant processing rather than broad-spectrum foraging per se. Moreover, burned rock middens distributed across most of Texas and spanning all prehistoric periods imply a significant reliance on plants (Black et al. 1997, Dering 2003, Thoms 2008). Alston Thoms (2008: 122) describes the intensified use of earth ovens and wild root foods in Texas as a “carbohydrate revolution” that occurred along the boundary separating the Plains, Southeast, and Southwest culture areas of North America. This has led to a call for more detailed paleoenvironmental reconstructions in and around these sites to determine the specific plant resources (primarily geophytes) at these locations (see Thoms 1989). Such investigations would, ostensibly, yield data concerning daily practice at such sites and thus contribute to determining local group identity. However, such studies have not proven to be particularly straightforward. For example, ecological data for the inulin-rich geophyte, case camas (Camassia spp.), often recovered from burned rock features, suggest that sustainable harvests of mature bulbs may have occurred no more frequently than every five years (Thoms 1989: 173–175). This suggests that many of these sites were indeed “specialized,” indicating site occupations may have occurred on a five-year cycle rather than on an annual or seasonal basis. This key bit of data also calls into question the frequency of feature use and the significance of specific types of plants in daily subsistence. Nevertheless, it underscores the value of a focused cultural ecology approach. Central Texas is also the only portion of Texas that borders almost every other area in the region. Therefore, ecotonal diversity is a matter of geographical fact and its flora and fauna, as well as water and mineral resources, are implicitly and, often, explicitly linked to surrounding areas. The Edwards Plateau drops from an elevation of more than three thousand feet above sea level (asl) in the northwest to fewer than seven hundred feet asl in the southeast and is underlain by Lower Cretaceous limestone or Karst geology. Sedimentary limestone often produces excellent tool-grade siliceous chert (popu157

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larly known as flint), which supplied Native Americans in this area with lithic resources for producing tools. The underlying Karst geology is also responsible for the numerous springs and rivers that emerge from and flow through this area. Nowhere is water more abundant in Central Texas than along the southern and eastern margins of the Balcones Escarpment where the largest springs in the state issue through cracks and fissures in the Balcones Fault (Brune 1975). The modern cities of Austin, San Antonio, San Marcos, New Braunfels, and Del Rio overlay Native American communities that were located on or near large springs and rivers that eventually flow into the Gulf of Mexico. Here early (e.g., Woolsey et al. 1936) as well as more recent archaeological investigations (Arnn 1997a, 1997b, 1997c, 1998; Arnn and Bousman 1997; Arnn and Kibler 1999; Bailey and Bousman 1989; Cargill and Brown 1997; Ricklis and Cox 1991; Shiner 1983) identified large cemeteries related to large sites along the Balcones Escarpment. Although cemeteries are rare west of the escarpment on the Edwards Plateau proper, individuals and occasionally groups were sometimes interred in rock cairn or crevice burials or in sinkhole and rockshelter ossuaries (Lintz and O’Neill 1993: 662, Shafer and Tomka 2004: 17). The presence of specific burial locations suggests to some (Weir 1976, Prewitt 1981, Shafer and Tomka 2004) increased territorialism, as well as population growth, during the Late Archaic. However, Johnson and Goode (1994) point to the appearance of marine shells and boatstones as evidence of extensive trade networks and increased contact with external groups to the east and southeast. Moreover, ossuary burials similar to those in Central Texas have also been found just east of the escarpment (Shafer and Tomka 2004: 17). Typical for Texas, projectile point types are considered diagnostic of different time intervals during the Late Archaic of Central Texas (from earliest to latest): Bulverde, Pedernales, Montell/Castroville/Marshall/ Marcos, Frio/ Ensor/Fairland, and Darl (Shafer and Tomka 2004: 17). But the Late Archaic Period in Central Texas is generally characterized by well-established, abundant, but varied, resources, as well as a large human population base that together provided significant impetus for social interaction with surrounding areas. However, the continued accumulation of burned rock in sites indicates an enduring local subsistence tradition focused on plant gathering and processing. Some (Shafer and Tomka 2004: 17) also suggest that a combination of drier conditions, increasing population, and reduced territory size resulted in the intensified use of plant resources and white-tailed deer. The western edge of the Edwards Plateau is bounded by the Pecos River, flowing southeast from New Mexico. This river and the Stockton Plateau 158

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on its west bank mark the eastern portion of the Trans-Pecos area of Texas. Situated almost entirely in the Chihuahuan Desert and bisected from north to south by the Guadalupe and Davis Mountains, the Trans-Pecos is higher and drier than any other part of Texas. Mountains rise above the desert floor to more than 2,300 meters (7,800 feet) and average annual precipitation is generally fewer than 24.4 centimeters (10 inches) (Cloud 2004: 9). Mallouf (2005: 237), citing paleoenvironmental studies, states that by 3000 B.P., the advent of the Late Archaic Period, biotic communities were similar to those we see today, with more mesic (wetter) conditions between 3000 B.P. and 2200 B.P. The early Late Archaic Period in this area is marked by numerous Central Texas dart point styles and a dramatic increase in the number of sites in “practically every ecological niche in the region” (Cloud 2004: 19). These changes are viewed by some as a westward expansion of Central Texas peoples and/or increased social interaction between the Central and the Trans-Pecos peoples, stemming from wetter climatic conditions throughout the area (Cloud 2004, Cloud et al. 1994, Ing et al. 1996, Mallouf 1985, 1990). Mallouf (2005: 237) suggests that a wetter environment may have ushered unprecedented numbers of bison into this area and thus, Central Texas peoples may have followed. However, he also points to the conspicuous absence of large bison kill sites found at other Plains sites and the general absence of bison in faunal assemblages from the eastern Trans-Pecos. Furthermore, the characteristics of this period include not only an obvious reliance on hunting and the development of an area-specific dart point style (the Paisano point), but also an intensified use of plant resources evidenced by the appearance of burned rock features and middens throughout the area. Although the increase in burned rock middens suggests direct contact and shared technology with Central Texas, hot rock cooking was known in this area prior to the Late Archaic. Thus, it remains unclear what these features and artifacts mean in terms of interaction and identity. Nevertheless, the appearance of the Paisano dart point at this time may reflect local Trans-Pecos peoples asserting their identity through stylistic variation of a common artifact class (e.g., dart points). Following the end of mesic conditions at the beginning of the Late Archaic, this period in the Trans-Pecos is generally characterized by a return to more xeric conditions and minor shifts in subsistence patterns, an expansion of dart point styles, a greater diversification of material culture, a significant increase in population, and the development of a highly diversified subsistence base (Mallouf 2005: 236). Cloud (2004: 19) also notes that many artifacts remained in use from the Late Archaic Period well into the Late Pre159

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historic Period, at which time Jornada Mogollon agriculturalists entered the western portions of the Trans-Pecos area. Although the adoption of agriculture was slow to follow and absent in most places altogether, the adoption of the bow and arrow is evident between about A.D. 200 and 500 by the appearance of small projectile points, most notably the Figueroa point (Cloud 2004: 20, Mallouf 1999: 60). Immediately north and east of the Trans-Pecos are the Llano Estacado and the Rolling Plains of the Texas Panhandle and North Central Texas. Although paleoenvironmental data suggest that this area was slightly drier than modern conditions, the northern portion is crosscut east to west by the Canadian River Valley and the southern portion is bisected north to south by a large escarpment, the Caprock, which once featured many flowing springs at its base. The more xeric conditions of the Late Archaic supported both mixed grass and short-grass prairie throughout much of the region, which provided excellent pasture for bison and antelope. Bison, in particular, played a significant role in the settlement and subsistence strategies of this period. In light of more than thirty years of additional data recovery, Boyd (1997) redefines two previously recognized archaeological complexes, Little Sunday and Summers (Hughes 1955, Leonhardy 1966), into a single complex, the Little Sunday, for this vast area. The expanded Little Sunday Complex is based on a seasonal model of canyonland foraging/plains bison hunting in which Late Archaic bison hunters spent a significant part of the year in the relatively well-watered and sheltered Caprock Canyonlands at the base of the escarpment (Boyd 1997: 267). Repeated occupations at base camps and rockshelters in the canyonlands attest to the pivotal role of this ecotone to local populations. Subsistence in the canyonlands depended primarily on broadspectrum foraging, and the presence of burned rock features, indicating rock ovens, as well as grinding tools at some of these sites suggests a significant reliance on plant resources (Boyd 1997: 267). Bison hunting took place at other times on the Llano Estacado to the west or on the Rolling Plains to the east. The significance of bison hunting is evidenced by communal kill sites, such as jumps and traps, where dozens of animals were killed at a time (Boyd 1997: 267). The Little Sunday Complex is also represented by the widespread distribution of broad-bladed, corner- to side-notched, straight- to expandingstemmed dart points often found in Late Archaic bison kills (Boyd 1997: 234). Association with bison is often emphasized, but these points also occur frequently throughout the region and often in contexts unrelated to bison. Boyd (1997: 234) suggests that the contemporaneity, morphological similarities, and widespread distribution of these point styles are evidence for a 160

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single cultural tradition. Other evidence can be seen in the pattern of flexed, cremated, or secondary (bundle) interments found in oval rock cairns situated on high bluffs or prominences. Interestingly, many of the artifacts associated with these burials (beads, gorgets, and tinklers) are often made from exotic materials such as conch and olivella marine shell. In fact, one artifact type specific to this area and time period is the lunate stone, made almost exclusively from an exotic material known as greenstone (Boyd 1997: 253). Greenstone has been tentatively linked to the Davis Mountains more than 300 kilometers to the southwest, suggesting interaction well beyond the Panhandle Plains (Boyd 1997: 253). Approximately half of all lunate stones were recovered in burial contexts with dart points, suggesting to some that lunate stones are associated in some way with bison hunting. Boyd’s Little Sunday Complex emphasizes the widespread distribution of at least two artifact types (dart points and lunate stones) across a specific area (the Panhandle Plains) and a specific subsistence practice (bison hunting) during a particular period of time (the Late Archaic) as primary components for a cultural tradition. Although Boyd states that his interpretation of the Little Sunday Complex “is not intended to represent a particular group of people and in no way approximated a cultural phase,” he describes this complex as a “long-lived cultural tradition or lifestyle” that “crosscut cultural (e.g., linguistic and tribal) boundaries” (1997: 235). Thus, his description of the Little Sunday Complex is similar to Welsch and Terrell’s (1998) definition of a “social field.” North Texas, as well as Northeast Texas, present a similar, if somewhat less complete, picture of the Late Archaic Period. Although populations in the western portion of this area relied on bison, there also seemed to be some influence from the north (Oklahoma) as well as East Texas, evidenced by the predominance of the Gary dart point (Prikryl 1990: 74). Investigations conducted in North Texas demonstrate a significant increase in Late Archaic diagnostic points (3.5 times greater than the number of Middle Archaic diagnostics), as well as in the number of Late Archaic sites. Fully half of the sites examined showed no signs of occupation prior to this period (Prikryl 1990: 74). Prikryl (1990: 74–76), after Story (1981: 146), suggests that a combination of changes in environmental conditions, reductions in group mobility, innovations in technology and subsistence, and the accumulation of area-specific knowledge contributed to the dramatic increase in Late Archaic population. Reduced mobility during this period is also evident in the significant amount of local material used in tool production, the use of rock- lined hearths to process local plant resources, and the appearance of large fea161

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tures referred to as “Wylie pits” (Prikryl 1990: 76). Locally available quartzite represents between 60 and 85 percent of the debitage found at many sites (Prikryl 1990: 76) and stone-lined hearths indicate local plant processing in rock ovens. Wylie pits, described as large (15–30 meters in diameter and 2–3 meters in depth) excavations, also appear to be associated with large-scale food (primarily plant) processing and contain a wide range of artifact types (Bruseth and Martin 1987: 280–284, Lynott 1975). In addition, Wylie pits also served as repositories for group or individual burials (Bruseth and Martin 1987, Lynott 1975, Prikryl 1990). Although their exact purpose remains unclear, Wylie pits are viewed by some archaeologists as evidence for group aggregation and organized labor forces. This type of social interaction, in turn, is considered a reaction to increasing local population density, as well as evidence of territoriality, similar to the burned rock middens of Central Texas and the cemeteries of the coastal plain during the Late Archaic Period (Bruseth and Martin 1987, Fields et al. 2000, Hall 1998, Lynott 1975, Prikryl 1990, Ricklis 1995, Story 1990). There is a general perception that population growth during the Late Archaic Period was a region-wide phenomenon in Texas. However, the evidence for growth during this time is most apparent in specific areas rather than throughout the region as a whole. Perhaps nowhere is this more graphically demonstrated than in North Texas, where Late Archaic projectile points represent 80 percent of the dart points assigned to a specific period. In addition, despite the predominate use of chert in all periods prior to and after this period, local quartzite was the dominant material used during the Late Archaic Period to produce projectile points (Prikryl 1990: 53–55). Prikryl (1990: 74) points to wetter local conditions and the corresponding development of the West Fork paleosol as key environmental factors necessary to support plentiful plant resources in this area during the Late Archaic. Local peoples responded by targeting these resources, and the appearance of specific features—such as burned rock features, Wylie pits, and group interments—as well as an overall increase in sites, artifact classes, and the local materials used in their manufacture provide abundant evidence for local growth. The same can also be said for the area immediately to the south, sometimes referred to as the northeast margin of Central Texas (Fields et al. 2000: 15). Late Archaic components at stratified Archaic sites throughout this area represent the “densest concentrations of cultural materials,” the use of burned rock middens also intensifies, and the appearance of large cemeteries along drainages reflects an increasingly common pattern seen elsewhere in the state (Fields et al. 2000: 17). Johnson and Goode (1994) see two distinct subdivisions during the Late Archaic in this area, the first reflecting a population in162

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crease during the early part of this period and the second occurring somewhat later as local groups shift to ceremonial rituals and religious ideology linked to Eastern Woodland influences. Although Johnson and Goode (1994) generally note ties to the east, Fields et al. (2000: 19) suggest that the western portion of the Blackland Prairie immediately north and primarily south of the Brazos River possesses strong cultural ties with Central Texas.

sUmmarIZIng Changes assoCIated WIth the Late arChaIC PerIod The stabilization of essentially “modern” climatic patterns (3000 B.P.), followed by the establishment of modern biotic communities (ca. 2500 B.P.), suggests Late Archaic humans shifted their subsistence and settlement patterns to match spatial and temporal variations in seasonally abundant fixed resources. In short, broad-spectrum foraging continued to be practiced in much the same way as it had throughout most of the Archaic and, perhaps, even the Paleo-Indian period. However, it did become more intensive, localized, and specialized. Hunting remained important during the Late Archaic, and subsistence and settlement patterns also continued to focus on fixed seasonal resource patches, characterized primarily by abundant water and edible plants in a more or less specific spatial range. Walter Taylor (1964) used the term “tether” to describe the way in which hunter-gatherers in arid and semi-arid environments tended to concentrate their activities and, by extension, their territories around reliable water sources. A similar concept may be applied to situations in which subsistence specialization focuses on several fixed seasonal resources that limit a group’s geographic range. Cumulative knowledge and increased frequency in manipulating materials and resources within a specific range may eventually have led to intensification of resources, population growth, and the establishment of territories marked by cemeteries. However, as noted above, the Late Archaic was apparently not the first time these types of activities and practices occurred. The Buckeye Knoll cemetery indicates that Early Archaic people were already involved in these same activities more than three thousand years prior to the Late Archaic. With respect to population, at least two scenarios, neither mutually exclusive, may be applicable: 1) periodic increases in population attributable to regional climate stabilization occurred during the Archaic (primarily during the Early and Late Archaic), and/or 2) population growth remained relatively constant throughout the Archaic period in general, but significant developments (i.e., 163

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territorialism, cemeteries, and social, economic, and political networks) occurred in specific places and times due to local variations in resources and people’s abilities to develop specialized and intensive ways to exploit those resources. Since most of the key indicators for population growth (e.g., increases in site size and the number of sites, increased use of plant resources, and cemeteries) during the Late Archaic are remarkably consistent throughout most of the region, a reasonable conclusion is that population growth was due to some region-wide conditioning factor. That factor appears to be the stabilization of biotic communities at key points during the Archaic Period in general, rather than just the Late Archaic Period in particular. These biotic communities, however, differed extremely from one area to the next. Thus, the specific materials, features, and functions of the region-wide indicators of population growth differ from one area to the next (e.g., chert vs. quartzite, Wylie pits vs. burned rock middens, aggregation vs. dispersion). For example, although burned rock technology was used to process plant foods across most of this region during the Late Archaic, it was not used to process the same plants throughout the region. Although the stabilization of biotic communities provided a trigger for a regional pattern of demographic growth, that growth emerged from local-level adaptations to very specific and localized environmental conditions. Moreover, the climatic conditions of the Late Archaic produced not only abundant, but also primarily consistent resources over large geographic areas that did not require the higher degree of mobility practiced by previous generations of hunter-gatherers. In most cases, this translated into reduced foraging ranges and the establishment of specific territories. Thus, the emphasis should be on the differences rather than on the similarities—specificity, particularity, and localness. For example, burned rock middens represent processing of specific plant resources in specific local environments, cemeteries are locations where a particular group of people consistently buried their dead, and large habitation sites should be viewed as residential bases regularly reoccupied by the same families. Archaeologists have long recognized that the material culture found in the state roughly parallels certain areas that often correspond to biotic provinces and ecoregions. These areas also contained numerous diverse environmental zones, each containing its own microenvironments with high-density as well as low-density resource patches. It is the adaptation to these specific areas that warrants the term “specialized broad-spectrum foragers” for groups in these areas and throughout the region during the Late Archaic. Although we may never know the names or languages of these communities and/or cultural 164

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groups, it may be possible to determine the nature of their subsistence and settlement patterns based on specialized adaptations to local environments and, by extension, the extent of their territories and areas and the frequency, extent, and intensity of their interaction with other communities and groups. This approach to hunter-gatherer behavior also reinforces the now generally accepted view that different site types represent the constituent parts of a community composed of nuclear families (Binford 1980, Kelly 1995, Willey and Phillips 1958). Moreover, if the daily practice seen in the residential bases provides the baseline data necessary for community identity construction, then participation in a wider social aggregate in a broader environmental setting also provides the constituent elements necessary for the construction of cultural identity found within marriage/linguistic groups. This does not imply that forager identity is based solely on environmental conditioning factors. It does acknowledge, however, a fundamental and significant aspect of hunter-gatherer identity: their intimate relationship with a specific landscape. Moreover, this identity is at least implicit, if not explicit, in the material culture found within the territory of a specific community and/or the combined ranges of communities within a hunter-gatherer social aggregate, such as a marriage/linguistic or cultural group. The picture emerging from the Late Archaic is one of numerous communities adapting to and living in ecologically circumscribed ranges, each practicing specialized subsistence and settlement patterns. From this experiential knowledge base came a cumulative and intimate understanding of the landscape that not only sustained human populations, but also permitted them to grow and interact in increasingly more complex ways. Thus, the population growth experienced after climatic stabilization is similar in some ways to Robert Braidwood’s (1960) “readiness hypothesis.” For example, the Late Archaic represents “ever increasing cultural differentiation and specialization of human communities.” He viewed this as a prelude to the food production revolution of agriculture in many areas around the world (Braidwood 1960: 134). However, in Texas the cultural differentiation and specialization of human communities did not necessarily culminate in agriculture for everyone. Nor did it occur just once during the Late Archaic. It had appeared more than three thousand years earlier during the Early Archaic and, perhaps, several more times in the intervening years. Moreover, it seems likely that specialization and differentiation were often characterized by stuttering fits and starts rather than by a continuously progressive linear model. It is also important to remember that, despite an implicitly conservative and insular cultural tradition revolving around specific and often fixed re165

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sources in a geographically diverse region, these communities did not live in isolation on the landscape. Instead, they were integrated into a vast web of social relations, subject to the inconsistencies of nature, the vagaries of climate, and the actions of their neighbors, and, when combined, all played a hand in the development of local, as well as regional, cultural patterns. For example, rock oven features and burned rock middens reflect a panregional technological adaptation for processing plants. However, the species of plants found in these features varies from one locale to the next, reflecting the variation in fixed botanical resources across the landscape. Similarly, although the style of Gary projectile points appears to have spread from Northeast Texas across North Texas, most Gary points were manufactured from local materials (e.g., quartzite or chert). These data indicate that numerous groups from Northeast Texas all the way to the Trans-Pecos interacted with other groups well beyond their specific territories during the Late Archaic. Although some projectile points types (i.e., Gary and Paisano) appear to be confined to specific areas, albeit rather large ones, the eventual spread of most Late Archaic point styles throughout the state suggests remarkable articulation among many small groups of people. Nor, as some (Hall 1998, Kibler 2005, Johnson and Goode 1994) point out, was this diffusion simply confined to a specific artifact class. It also included exotic materials, such as marine shell and minerals, as well as technology and daily practice. Moreover, diffusion is a vague concept at best. Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary defines it as “the spread of cultural elements from one area or group of people to others by contact.” This definition does not explain Late Archaic events that preceded, precipitated, and formed the social structure for much of the Late Prehistoric Period. Some aspects of technology and style, such as hot rock technology and projectile point types, are distributed well beyond the bounds of a single group’s range and are found in adjacent areas and/or throughout the region. Similarly, exotic materials are common in burials, but their inclusion in domestic contexts suggests they were a pervasive, if uncommon, element in the daily life of Late Archaic peoples. Along these same lines, if Late Archaic communities were, in fact, tethered to geographically circumscribed areas, how, why, and in what manner did exotic goods enter the territories of specific communities and areas of specific cultural groups? Why were some practices and technologies adopted and others ignored? These questions are similar to those concerning later Toyah peoples and, in light of other archaeological investigations, equally applicable to other periods (i.e., Early Archaic). On a continuum, the Late Archaic Period may be considered ancestral 166

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to similar technologies and practices observed during the Late Prehistoric I and II Periods in much the same way that the Early Archaic can be viewed as a precursor to the Late Archaic Period. When viewed as a point along this continuum, the Toyah social field suggests the latest version of a far older regional hunter-gatherer tradition based on individual communities interacting through social networks in order to enrich their lives as well as mitigate the effects of a variable environment.

IntrodUCtIon to the Late PrehIstorIC PerIod The perspective presented above suggests the continuity of many social, subsistence, and technological practices from at least the Late Archaic Period into the Late Prehistoric Period, as well as a continued focus on seasonally available high-density and low-density resources within specific environments distributed unevenly across the landscape. This continuity in broadspectrum foraging patterns is noted in virtually every cultural context of published archaeological investigations conducted outside of areas that eventually adopted agriculture (e.g., East Texas, Panhandle Plains, and La Junta de los Rios) and resulted in the term “Neoarchaic” (Prewitt 1981, 1983) to describe the early portion of the Late Prehistoric Period or Late Prehistoric I Period, which is often referred to as the “Austin Phase,” or “Austin Interval” (Collins 1995). However, the term “Austin Phase” was originally intended to describe material cultures located in Central Texas (Collins 1995). As Greer (1976: 143–147) and Shafer (1977: 19–21) pointed out, roughly a dozen Austin Phase sites—the vast majority of which were located north and/or east of the Edwards Plateau along the Colorado and/or Brazos River drainages—were intensively excavated in the 1970s, and most of these were rockshelters and/ or cemeteries rather than large open campsites. In other words, these investigations were limited in terms of both the site type sampled (rockshelters and cemeteries) and the geographic and environmental zones covered (primarily Blackland Prairie and the Lampasas Cut Plain). Intensively excavated residential base camps in this portion of Central Texas were rare and this remains largely true today with some notable exceptions. As a result of those early excavations, the Austin Phase is thought to have occurred approximately between A.D. 700 and 1300. It is characterized primarily by the replacement of dart points with a smaller, thinner, and lighter projectile point (Scallorn), which is commonly viewed as an indicator for the adoption of the bow and arrow. Archaeologically, this time period is generally 167

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characterized by the temporally diagnostic Scallorn arrow point, a primarily bifacial reduction technology in the lithic assemblage (as opposed to a later unifacial and blade technology in the Toyah Interval), and a continuation of the broad-based hunting and gathering economy of the Late Archaic Period (Collins 1994: 14). However, the limited geographic focus of initial Austin Phase investigations had an unintended effect on the conceptualization of post–Archaic and pre–Toyah archaeology. Archaeologists applied interpretations from the Central Texas Austin Phase, either implicitly or explicitly, as a general standard by which to interpret the character of post–Archaic material cultures throughout the state. In the absence of other contemporaneous analogs (e.g., intensively excavated sites in other areas of Central Texas as well as areas outside of Central Texas), this is understandable. It is also recognized that many initial interpretations concerning the Austin Phase in Central Texas remain largely undisputed today—a testament in itself to the quality of research. But the net result of using the Central Texas Austin Phase as an analog for the rest of the region is that it tended to obscure the variation found in material culture from other areas of the state. To a greater or lesser extent, this is the tale that can be told for archaeology throughout Texas—in the absence of any regional synthesis within the last forty years, Texas archaeology remains firmly divided into distinct culture areas. However, occasionally a regional archaeological phenomenon, such as Toyah, rears its head and underscores the need for regional synthesis. Synthesis requires a holistic approach capable of distinguishing local variation and regional networks among various communities and cultural groups, as well as the interaction that integrated these identities. Perhaps nowhere is this need more crucial than in the Late Prehistoric Period, particularly with respect to the differences between the Austin and Toyah Intervals. As a whole, the Late Prehistoric Period is generally characterized by the adoption of the bow and arrow, the return of large numbers of bison to most of Texas, and the introduction and spread of ceramics and agriculture. But due to the erratic way in which some or all of these things developed or spread in some areas or, in some cases, did not occur at all, the Late Prehistoric is subdivided into the Austin Phase and/or Late Prehistoric I and the Toyah Phase and/or Late Prehistoric II. For example, the bow and arrow spread throughout the region by about A.D. 700, but more than a thousand years passed from the time pottery appeared in East Texas to its eventual use by people inhabiting Central Texas. Similarly, although agriculture is a hallmark of the Late Prehistoric in North America, it arrived relatively late in Texas. Once established, farming appears 168

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to have been confined primarily to the large river valleys of the Panhandle, Trans-Pecos, and North and East Texas, but apparently never caught on in the central and southern portions of the state during prehistory. Similarly, the much-heralded return of bison throughout Texas is thought by many archaeologists to have occurred much later, sometime around A.D. 1200. So, on the one hand, there is evidence for spatially and temporally uniform diffusion of some ideas and/or technologies in the form of a single artifact class (e.g., small projectile points and, by extension, the bow and arrow) and, on the other hand, there are very different spatial and temporal patterns for the distribution of other technologies and practices. In terms of interaction, this suggests differential access and participation (for any number of reasons) by individuals and groups in communities, marriage/linguistic groups, social aggregates, networks, and a regional social field. The size and diversity of this region also suggests that the reasons for differential access and participation were complex.

Late PrehIstorIC arChaeoLogy: a regIonaL PersPeCtIve Throughout most of Texas, the transition from the latter part of the Late Archaic Period, or Transitional Late Archaic, to Late Prehistoric I is marked by the rapid and widespread appearance of the bow and arrow (Collins 1995, Turner and Hester 1993, Prewitt 1981). In Central Texas, this is inferred from the reduction in Late Archaic dart point sizes (Ensor, Frio, and Darl points) and the corresponding appearance (ca. A.D. 600–700) of the smaller, thinner, and lighter Scallorn projectile point of the Austin Phase (Collins 1995, Turner and Hester 1993, Prewitt 1981). Scallorn arrow points frequently occur in mortuary contexts in Central Texas, primarily east and north of the Edwards Plateau, where they have been implicated as the cause of death in a number of Austin Phase burials (Prewitt 1974). The end of the Austin Phase and/or Late Prehistoric I is generally marked by the replacement of Scallorn points with Perdiz points and the appearance of ceramics throughout much of Texas after approximately A.D. 1250. However, several archaeologists (Creel 1990, Fields 1995, Greer 1976, Cloud et al. 1994, Hester 1995, Prikryl 1990, Ricklis 1996, Weinstein 1992) suggest that the commonly accepted sequence from Late Archaic dart points to Austin Phase Scallorn arrow points to Toyah Phase Perdiz points and ceramics may not be so clear-cut. Greer (1976) points to contemporaneous or at least overlapping associations for Scallorn and Perdiz based on data from 169

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the Wheatley Site (41BC114) in Central Texas. In South Texas, Scallorn points have been found in association with dart points and Perdiz points at a number of sites (Hester 1995: 443). Although the expanding stem Scallorn point is the most widely distributed arrow point found in Texas during the Late Prehistoric I Period, several other points are associated with this period, including Agee, Alba, Catahoula, Colbert, Friley, Hayes (East Texas); Edwards and Sabinal (southern edge of the Edwards Plateau); Livermore (Trans-Pecos); Chadbourne and Moran (North Central Texas); Deadman’s arrow point (Panhandle); and perhaps Lott points (southern Llano Estacado, Trans-Pecos, and northwest Edwards Plateau) (Boyd 1997, Prewitt 1995, Turner and Hester 1993). However, the widespread distribution and frequency of Scallorn points and that point’s implicit association with early Austin Phase contexts tends to mask the variability in early Late Prehistoric or Late Prehistoric I point types found throughout the state. The same may also be said for the sequence of events concerning other artifact classes. Although pottery was not typical of sites in Central Texas until after approximately A.D. 1250, ceramics were apparently present much earlier and perhaps relatively common in adjacent areas (Perttula et al. 1995). For example, ceramics were present as early as 500 B.C. in portions of East Texas (Perttula et al. 1995: 175), and Scallorn points have been found in association with ceramics, albeit in somewhat questionable contexts, fairly frequently in South Texas. For example, at Choke Canyon in South Texas, more than half a dozen sites contained Scallorn points and ceramics (Hall et al. 1986: 403), and Huskey (1935: 109) suggested similar contexts for sites investigated around Uvalde. This suggests a later context for Scallorn points and/ or an earlier adoption of ceramics in these areas. This also suggests greater continuity between the Late Prehistoric I and the Late Prehistoric II Periods than was observed in Austin Phase contexts farther north. However, the co-occurrence of Scallorn and Perdiz and/or Scallorn and ceramics is generally viewed as resulting from poor depositional integrity rather than from any sort of continuity. Although this perspective may be valid in some cases, it is also possible that continuity between these components is questioned primarily because it is inconsistent with Austin Phase sites from Central Texas. In short, the associations documented in the Central Texas rockshelters and mortuary contexts of the Austin Phase are considered the standard by which to judge contexts in other areas. But as Greer (1976: 142) notes, of the Central Texas rockshelters, “the only excavated site showing evidence for total distributional separation between Scallorn and Perdiz, is the Smith Rockshelter (Suhm 1957).” In fact, there 170

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does seem to be greater diversity in culture sequences throughout Texas than is implied by the Austin Phase of Central Texas, and this should be explicitly recognized when discussing regional archaeological cultures so that it does not bias interpretation. In light of the number of sites documented in the last forty years containing Perdiz and Scallorn points in association with each other, it seems unlikely that we can simply dismiss every case as an example of poor depositional context. Along the southern Edwards Plateau, Solberger (1978) and Mitchell (1978) identified what they called the “Turtle Creek Phase,” based primarily on the occurrence of an early and distinct arrow point type, the Edwards point. Subsequent investigations confirmed the presence of Edwards, as well as Scallorn and yet another point type, the Sabinal. This suggests a sequence of Edwards/ Scallorn A.D. 860 to 1130 with Sabinal coming somewhat later, A.D. 1120 to 1250 (Mitchell 1978). As Henderson (2001: 15) points out, it remains unclear whether the Turtle Creek Phase represents a unique and relatively static cultural group (Solberger 1978) or a dynamic cultural continuum (Mitchell 1978). Nevertheless, all these point styles were subsequently replaced by Perdiz sometime around A.D. 1300. Much farther south in the Rio Grande Delta, the cultural sequence for the Late Prehistoric is not well understood, although it does appear to share a somewhat similar sequence with the rest of South Texas in that the bow and arrow and ceramics are present but agriculture is not (Hester 1995: 443). The first evidence for ceramics in this portion of South Texas is also problematic. When first identified, ceramics in South Texas were attributed to either Spanish missions or the Toyah Horizon from Central Texas (Black 1986, Hester 1995: 446, Jackson 1938). However, work in the Rio Grande Delta and Mexico suggested ceramics may have been present earlier in far South Texas, due to trade with Mexico, than in areas farther north (Anderson 1932, Sayles 1935, MacNeish 1958). For example, Toyah artifacts are not particularly common in the Rio Grande Delta area and most ceramics found there appear to have come from Mexico via Huastecan influence as part of the Brownsville Complex, rather than through the Toyah of Central Texas (Hester 1988, 1994; Wagner 2003; Wagner and Valdez 2000). Regardless of their origin, ceramics do not occur with great frequency in Cameron County, but are relatively common on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande Delta. Although data from intensively excavated sites are rare for this area, available data indicate that Brownsville Complex people used coastal clay dune formations for campsites and cemeteries and relied on hunting and logistical collecting (Hester 1995: 446–447, Kibler 1994: 62, Prewitt 1974). The 171

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Brownsville Complex also possessed a distinct artifact assemblage characterized by ornamental shell objects, bone artifacts, and small unstemmed Cameron and Starr arrow point types commonly found at these sites (Ricklis 1995, Hester 1995: 446–447, Prewitt 1974). Perhaps best known for its shell industry and non-local ceramics of Mexican origin, some resembling Huastecan ceramics, the Brownsville Complex is also known for the exotic jadeite and obsidian artifacts found in open campsites, dunes, and burials. Shell artifacts include Oliva sayana beads and tinklers, Marginella apicina beads, disk-shaped Busycon conch shell beads, gorgets, and columella pendants and beads. Hester (1995: 448) suggests Huastec merchants obtained obsidian and jade through interaction with Toltec and Aztec trade networks, by trading with traveling merchants known as pochteca. These exotic items and Huastecan ceramics were then exchanged, through intermediary people who lived in what is now the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, for products of the Brownsville Complex shell industry. The extensive shell bead industry produced by the Brownsville Complex people drove this trade network (Hester 1995: 449). The Barril Complex, identified by MacNeish (1958) and dated to approximately A.D. 1000, was once thought to be older than and distinct from the Brownsville Complex, as well as confined primarily to the southern side of the Rio Grande. Both complexes were centered on the Rio Grande delta, and diagnostically, both were defined by a shell industry, small triangular arrow points, and Huastecan-like ceramics, dating to the Late Prehistoric Period (MacNeish 1958: 189). However, more recent research (Terneny 2005) focusing on two Brownsville Complex sites, 41CF2 and 41HG1 (the Floyd Morris and Ayala sites), suggests that Barril and Brownsville Complexes are more closely related. Both sites contained human burials in association with numerous Brownsville Complex artifacts. Radiocarbon assays conducted on human bone at 41HG1 confirm a Late Prehistoric context for the Ayala Site burials, and dates from the Floyd Morris Site (41CF2) extend the Brownsville Complex burials back to the Late Archaic (Terneny 2005: 197). These new data introduce significant time depth for the Brownsville Complex and call into question Barril origins for that complex. This suggests that concepts surrounding the origins, identity, and spatial distribution of these two complexes may need to be reconsidered. Yet another distinct material culture, represented primarily by several sites located in large rockshelters along deeply incised streams and rivers, has been identified in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands. Here, the dry rockshelters provided protection from the elements and the outstanding preservation evi172

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dences continuous occupation from the Paleo-Indian Period into the Late Prehistoric I Period (Dibble 1967, Johnson 1964). However, evidence for continuous occupations into the Late Prehistoric II is sporadic and demonstrated primarily by the presence of Perdiz, Toyah, and Harrell arrow points (Dibble 1967, 1978; Johnson 1964; Turpin 1995). The latter occupation was superseded by yet another material culture identified as the Infierno Phase (Dibble 1978, Turpin 1995) which, according to Turpin, is the only cultural manifestation in the Lower Pecos that meets the qualifications for a culture “phase” (Turpin 1995: 553). Evidence for the Infierno Phase is based primarily on findings from 41VV446 consisting of one hundred stone circles thought to be the remains of structures, perhaps tipis, and an artifact assemblage composed of plain brownware ceramics, steeply beveled end scrapers, beveled knives, and small triangular-stemmed arrow points (Turpin 1982, 1995, 2004). A significant problem for Infierno archaeology is chronometric (Mehalchik et al. 1999: 155). The depositional setting for Infierno sites generally consists of little more than a bedrock bench. Thus, there are rarely any intact deposits at these sites and preservation of datable organic material is poor. Although there are no absolute dates in direct association with the Infierno Phase, most archaeologists agree that Infierno sites were occupied approximately between A.D. 1500 and 1780 (Turpin 1995, Turpin and Robinson 1998). The Infierno Phase remains poorly understood and problematic. Despite its late estimated age, not a single European item has been recovered from an Infierno site (Turpin 1995: 553). Infierno assemblages are similar to Toyah in terms of ceramics and lithics (Mehalchik et al. 1999). However, Turpin (1995) also points to similarities in late Apache mission phase pottery and Infierno ceramics. Spanish accounts document several groups from northern Mexico visiting this area in the seventeenth century to hunt bison (Turpin 2004: 277). Infierno may also represent a late indigenous refugee population composed of several fragmented groups holed up in the Lower Pecos. Whatever the case, Infierno seems to present a distinct material culture with specific temporal and spatial limits (Turpin 1995: 553). In the Panhandle Plains and Llano Estacado, significant cultural change occurred from the first millennium onward. Lintz (1986) suggests Plains Woodland incursions into the eastern Panhandle as early as A.D. 1. However, Woodland ceramics occur only in very limited numbers prior to A.D. 450, and, although corn was found here, it too occurs only in extremely limited contexts (Couzzourt 1988). Although Lintz argues that the Palo Duro Complex A.D. 400–800 is a Woodland phenomenon, others see Southwestern influence and some (Boyd 1995, 2004) suggest indigenous roots. 173

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Despite the fact that the Palo Duro Complex has a ceramic tradition, Plains Woodland ceramics are also found in the northern portions of the Palo Duro Complex area and Jornada Mogollon brownware is often found in southern areas (Boyd 1995, 1997, 2004). Thus, it appears that the Palo Duro Complex was sandwiched squarely between Plains Woodland people encroaching from the north and Jornada Mogollon people pushing east. Whatever the case, it seems that the Plains Woodland gave way to the Palo Duro Complex around A.D. 500 (Boyd 1995, 1997, 2004). The Antelope Creek Phase (ca. A.D. 1200–1500) marks the onset of the Plains Village aspect, characterized by an increase in maize agriculture. Increased sedentism is also evident in large villages of semi-subterranean houses with stone slabs lining interior walls, cache or storage pits, and a ceramic tradition of cordmarked pottery. The lithic assemblage of the Late Prehistoric Period has been characterized as a bison hunting tool kit consisting of smaller arrow points, beveled knives, hafted endscrapers, blades and microblades (Black 1986, Prewitt 1981, Turner and Hester 1993). With respect to sociocultural identity and interaction, as well as temporal scales, it is interesting to note that Coronado’s expedition was told by the Puebloans that the Quivirans lived on the plains in houses of stone, practiced agriculture, and hunted bison. In terms of subsistence, technology, and settlement patterns, this description also applies to the prehistoric Antelope Creek culture. Thus, it is possible, perhaps even likely, that the Puebloans gave Coronado a slightly exaggerated description of abandoned Antelope Creek sites in order to accelerate his departure. The earliest ceramics in the upper Texas Panhandle Plains date to approximately A.D. 400 and appear to be related to Plains Woodland traditions of Oklahoma, Colorado, Kansas, and Nebraska (Perttula et al. 1995: 303 after Couzzourt 1985, 1988). These were eventually replaced by locally manufactured varieties of the Plains Village ceramics (ca. A.D. 1100/1200–1450/1500), such as Borger Cordmarked of the Antelope Creek Phase and cordmarked rim/lip-decorated ceramics of the Buried City Complex (Perttula et al. 1995: 204). Farther south in the lower Southern Plains and west in the Trans-Pecos, Chupadero Black-on-white, Three Rivers Red-on-terracotta, Jornada Brown, and El Paso Brownware are found in contexts dating between A.D. 950 and 1450 (Perttula et al. 1995: 207). Although some of this material is of Mexican origin from the Paquime culture sphere, by A.D. 1450 much of this area, as well as the Panhandle, was dominated by Puebloan (in this case, northern Rio Grande) glaze wares (Perttula et al. 1995: 207). In the Trans-Pecos area, the Livermore Phase (ca. A.D. 900–1200), char174

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acterized by the adoption of the Livermore arrow point, represents the beginning of the Late Prehistoric Period (Cloud et al. 1994: 12, Mallouf 1990: 9). Although Kelley, Campbell, and Lehmer (Kelley et al. 1940: 162–163) suggested that the Livermore point was introduced by Southern Plains groups, Mallouf (1990: 10) argues for indigenous development. Nevertheless, the Livermore Phase was soon replaced by two distinctive cultural manifestations, the Cielo Complex and the La Junta Aspect, living side by side at the confluence of the Rio Concho and the Rio Bravo del Norte (Rio Grande) (Mallouf 1990). La Junta Aspect people practiced agriculture in sedentary villages consisting of pit-houses and open air ramadas (arbors) constructed on fertile river terraces along the canyon drainage (Mallouf 1990: 15). Located on high pediments overlooking these canyons, Cielo Complex sites were composed primarily of dozens of small circular stone enclosures (Mallouf 1990: 11). Stratigraphic and radiometric data indicate occupation between A.D. 1335 and 1690 (Mallouf 1990: 13). Mallouf (1990: 11) identifies several Cielo Complex site types, including short-lived residential base camps, specialized resource procurement sites, and special function/ritual sites. Base camps can consist of as many as fifty substantial above-ground circular or oval stone enclosures with a single entrance, between 2.5 to 3.5 meters in diameter, and constructed of two to three courses of variably sized cobbles. Typically, two to nine house structures are set approximately 3 to 10 meters apart on a high prominent landform, with entrances opening in a common direction (Mallouf 1990: 12). Artifact assemblages consist of Perdiz points, beveled knives, scrapers, and perforators and, with the exception of ceramics, are “remarkably similar” to the assemblages found among La Junta agriculturalists (Mallouf 1990: 13–14). Mallouf also notes that these assemblages remain consistent until the final occupation period between A.D. 1650 and 1690 when basal-notched Garzalike arrow points enter the tool inventory along with a higher frequency of triangular-end scrapers and beveled knife fragments (Mallouf 1990: 14). Mallouf also speculates that these late changes in material culture may have signaled the influx of Plains Apache into the area. However, Boyd’s data (ca. 1997) concerning the Garza and Tierra Blanca/Apache postdates these ideas and was, therefore, unavailable to Mallouf. Thus, the changes in artifact assemblage may reflect Garza people pushed south by encroaching Plains Apache. Nonetheless, these hypotheses are not mutually exclusive and these data do suggest movement or displacement of specific groups during this period. Turning to North Central Texas, Prikryl (1990: 77) documents Scallorn, 175

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Catahoula, and Steiner arrow points, along with grog-tempered and sandtempered plainwares, an occasional Caddoan sherd, and the presence of corn during the Late Prehistoric I Period (ca. A.D. 700–1200). In an analysis of lithics from the multi-component Village Creek Sites (41TR136, Fountain; 41TR134, Riley; and 41TR152, Killian, respectively) just southeast of Fort Worth, Maxwell (2002) observed a distinct change from reliance on more local quartzites and gravels from the north, east, and west in the Late Prehistoric I Period to a marked increase in nonlocal Edwards chert resources from the south and west during the Late Prehistoric II Period. However, area archaeologists are quick to acknowledge that most conclusions concerning this area are not as straightforward as they appear. For example, multiple biotic provinces and numerous large rivers and drainages converge in this area and it is likely that significant wetland and riparian resources were once available to prehistoric inhabitants. Thus, the small number of large intact sites identified in the Dallas/Fort Worth area is somewhat puzzling. However, this area experienced significant and catastrophic flooding on multiple occasions in recorded history prior to the completion of extensive rechannelization of the Trinity River and tributaries by the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers in the 1950s. Therefore, it is unclear if the paucity of large sites in the floodplain of major drainages is due to destruction from development, channelization and construction of levees, a general reluctance on the part of prehistoric peoples to inhabit flood-prone areas, or a combination of all of these factors. In general, the archaeology in this area indicates rather brief and ephemeral occupations even in multi-component sites (Lintz et al. 2008). Tool-grade lithic resources are limited in this area and lithic artifacts often exhibit heavy reuse indicative of their long curation and high value (Maxwell 2002). However, it may also be true that lithic tools were not necessarily needed for obtaining many of the resources found here. Wood and bone tools, along with cordage, would have sufficed for procuring most wetland fauna (e.g., fish, shellfish, and water fowl). Thus, it is possible that both scarce locally available lithics and the absence of a specific need for stone tools, in terms of subsistence, all contributed to the paucity of durable artifacts and, by extension, poor site visibility. Nevertheless, anyone living in this area and using lithic tools must have relied on significant mobility and/or interaction with other groups in order to acquire them. Archaeologists (Prikryl 1990, Maxwell 2002) have observed that the ratio of quartzite to chert artifacts from site components shifts significantly over time, suggesting some type of change in local and area-wide interaction networks. Earlier interpretations of archaeology in this area often attributed lithic as 176

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well as ceramic assemblages to Caddo influence from the east (Perttula and Bruseth 1998, Perttula et al. 1995: 201). However, Prikryl (1990) and Maxwell (2002) point to significant amounts of local and/or more northern- and western-oriented quartzite sources for lithics recovered in Late Archaic and Late Prehistoric I components compared to higher densities of chert from areas to the south in later Late Prehistoric II components. In short, there is little physical evidence to support significant influence from the east (e.g., the Caddo area) during either Late Prehistoric I or Late Prehistoric II Periods. Kvernes (1998: 56) reaches similar conclusions based on variations in ceramic temper type, decorative style, and paste composition. Analysis of sherds recovered from a Late Prehistoric Period Village Creek site indicates an in situ and separate non–Caddo ceramic tradition. Kvernes (1998) also points to the early incorporation of shell temper in north Central Texas sites that predates the later widespread use of shell temper in Caddo ceramics post-A.D. 1400 documented by Perttula et al. (1995: 177). This implies that cultural, or at least technological, influence moved from west to east. Caddoan contact is evident in very small numbers of Caddo ceramics and Caddoan-associated projectile points in eastern portions of this area. However, Kvernes’s (1998) analysis of ceramics and Maxwell’s (2002) lithic analysis from sites in other portions of North Central Texas present evidence for in situ development and/or interaction independent of significant Caddo influence. The early portion of the Late Prehistoric II Period in this area and the Rolling Plains just to the west was termed the “Henrietta Focus” by Krieger (1946) and defined primarily by shell-tempered plain ware ceramics (Nocona Plain); Washita, Harrell, and Fresno arrow points; beveled knives; flake drills; and a significant increase of bison in faunal assemblages (Prikryl 1990: 80). At the Harrell Site, signs of farming were also evidenced by bison scapula hoes. More recently, pottery from some Henrietta Focus sites was reexamined, and previous amounts of ceramics containing shell temper were found to be incorrect (Prikryl 1990: 80). Therefore, Nocona Plain may not be as prevalent as was once thought. In addition, archaeologists have documented a different Late Prehistoric sequence in north and west Central Texas first recognized by Ray (1929) as the Sand Dune Culture and later by Sayles (1935) as the Brazos River Culture and eventually by both as the Brazos Culture (Creel 1990). Creel refers to this material culture as the “Blow Out Mountain Phase” and situates it chronologically and spatially as encompassing the later portion of the Brazos Culture area and extending into the Toyah Interval (ca. A.D. 800–900 to 1300) (1990: 15). Although stone-lined hearths and mussel shell features are often present, 177

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end scrapers, beveled knives, ceramics, and bison bone are generally not present, or occur in questionable context (Creel 1990: 16). The Blow Out Mountain Phase is, perhaps, best marked by at least three arrow point styles resembling Alba, Bonham, Zephyr. These arrow points, triangular with either straight or slightly rounded stems, have been described in very broad terms as Perdiz-like in shape (Arnn 2007), although they lack sharply contracting stems and are generally smaller than Perdiz points. However, Darl as well as Cliffton points are also associated with this phase. Most of these points are quite small, bifacially worked, and exquisitely made with generally prominent barbs and serrated edges (Creel 1990: 15). The great numbers of these points collected by Ray and Sayles during the 1920s and 1930s are now curated at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory. These collections also contain some Washita and Harrell points (Henrietta Focus) of approximately the same size and similar fine workmanship, but stylistically different. At least one point in these collections blends the attributes of both stemmed and triangular points. Precisely what the similarities and differences between these arrow points (Blow Out Mountain and Henrietta Focus) represent is unclear. However, the similarities—their close association, diminutive size, bifacial work and excellent craftsmanship, and their tentative assignment to a time roughly intermediate between the Late Prehistoric I and Late Prehistoric II—are provocative. Creel (1990: 16) also suggests the Blow Out Mountain Phase may be related to a specific mortuary tradition, unfortunately now largely destroyed, characterized by rock cairn and/or stone cist burials on prominent ridges or bluffs. Although the Blow Out Mountain Phase appears to have been shortlived and rapidly replaced by Toyah, Garza, and, perhaps, Henrietta peoples, rock cairn burials have been documented for the Late Prehistoric II Period in the Trans-Pecos (Cloud 2002) and farther south in the Mexican state of Chihuahua (Mallouf 1987). These stack stone burials are found on rocky prominences and often contain dozens of arrowheads ranging from Washita or Harrell to Toyah and Fresno. However, the overwhelming majority (90 percent) consist of Perdiz points (Cloud 2002, Mallouf 1987). In general, Blow Out Mountain sites are rare and its material culture poorly understood. In fact, some archaeologists do not accept its classification as a phase (Treece et al. 1993). Nevertheless, it presents a possible antecedent to Toyah, Garza, and Henrietta Focus in terms of its mortuary complex and attendant projectile points. Turning to the Central Texas coast, Weinstein (1992) divides the Late Prehistoric I into two phases spanning 450 years (ca. A.D. 700–1150), the first phase (Blue Bayou) characterized by Scallorn points and the second (Anaqua) 178

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by Scallorn points and sandy paste ceramics (Gadus et al. 1999: 24). In terms of subsistence and settlement patterns, Aten (1983), working primarily on the upper Texas coast, and Ricklis (1996), working along the central and upper coast, propose a bimodal seasonal round of fishing and shellfish collecting. More recently, Gadus (2005), working with shell dump and pile sites along the Central and upper Texas coast, suggests it may be possible to elicit subpatterning within bimodal seasonal rounds by examining artifact class and richness. Gadus proposes “a pattern of small scale aggregation and dispersal within a wider seasonal cycle that lasted from the Late Archaic to the Late Prehistoric and possibly into the Historic Period.” She also suggests that the key to understanding why stratified societies such as the Caddo did not develop along the coast may lie in a more complete knowledge of the extremely fluid inter- and intragroup dynamics of coastal peoples (2005: 177). It is important to note that Weinstein (1992) also divides the subsequent Late Prehistoric II Period into two phases that correspond roughly to the Toyah Interval. These latter phases are distinguished as separate coastal (Rockport) and inland (Berclair) components, but begin significantly earlier (ca. A.D. 1150) than Toyah sites in Central Texas (Gadus et al. 1999: 25). Both phases also possess the Toyah lithic assemblage and a sandy paste ware consisting of Rockport Plain, Rockport Black on Gray I and II (decorated with asphaltum), and Rockport Incised (Ricklis 1995a: 197–199). Ricklis (1996) also recognizes the Rockport Phase, but suggests inland sites are seasonally occupied campsites of the same Rockport Phase coastal people. He presents a pattern of seasonal rounds in which bands aggregated into large groups along the coast during fall and winter months to take advantage of fish runs and abundant shellfish. During the spring and summer, social aggregates dispersed into smaller groups and migrated inland to hunt bison on the Gulf Coastal Plain. Ricklis (1996: 97–99) proposes that at least one of these inland sites, the Melon Site (41RF21), was occupied simultaneously by Rockport Phase people and groups from farther inland that also possessed the entire Toyah assemblage. Although Ricklis’s basis for interaction at the Melon Site is founded on different types of ceramics, it is perhaps significant that virtually the entire Late Prehistoric II lithic assemblage on the Coastal Plain is identical to the Toyah lithic assemblage (Ricklis 1996, Weinstein 1992). However, Ricklis does present a slightly later date (ca. A.D. 1300) than Weinstein for the introduction of the Toyah lithic assemblage to the Gulf Coast. Farther inland on the Post Oak Savannah of east Central Texas, Fields documents sandy paste ceramics in the Trinity and Navasota drainages by 50 B.C. (Fields 1993: 119) and suggests dart points continued to be used here 179

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well after the bow and arrow was adopted (Fields 1995: 310). Much farther north, at Cooper Lake, Scallorn arrow points represent only 6 percent of the collection, whereas Colbert and Steiner points account for almost 40 percent, and ceramics are clearly present during the Late Prehistoric I Period (Fields 1995: 310). In general, Scallorn and, later, Perdiz points increase in frequency through time and as one moves farther south and west. However, the frequent occurrence of Alba and Bonham arrow points with Caddo ceramics in the middle Brazos drainage has prompted some (Gadus et al. 2006: 177, Shafer 2006b, Story 1990: 364) to look for Caddo influence. Although the origin of ceramics in this area remains unclear, most decorated sherds “are characteristic of pottery from Caddoan sites to the east” and some motifs are “strongly reminiscent of those on defined Caddoan types” (Fields 1995: 315). Excavations at the J. B. White Site (41MM341) in Milam County revealed an extensive Late Prehistoric I component on the Little River, with “arrow points and bifaces essentially identical in workmanship and raw materials to artifacts that have been found in mortuary and nonburial contexts at the early Caddo ceremonial center of the George C. Davis Site” (Gadus et al. 2006: 177). In his Prairie Caddo model, Shafer (2006b) suggests that in terms of “social identity,” the people occupying the central Brazos drainage were Caddoan bison hunters who seasonally advanced onto the Blackland Prairie in search of bison. Such an explanation would explain the presence of both Caddo ceramic and lithic assemblages in this area. However, as Gadus et al. (2006: 178) counters, Caddo ceramics are often conspicuously absent from these sites. Nonetheless, Shafer’s (2006b) model, in which social identity is associated with specific archaeological correlates in order to understand interaction, represents a unique and thoughtful contribution to Texas archaeology In the Pineywoods of East Texas, dates for the prehistoric origins of the Caddo range from approximately A.D. 700 at the George C. Davis Site in central East Texas (Story 1998) to A.D. 900 at sites in north East Texas (Bruseth 1998). The emergence of the Caddo has been attributed to Mississippian roots (Story 1981, 1998), as well as to Mesoamerican connections (i.e., the Gilmore Corridor, Krieger 1946). Wyckoff (1971) suggests a combination of influences from both Mesoamerica and the American Southeast, as well as incipient development evidenced in the Fourche Maline culture that occupied northeast Texas, southeast Oklahoma, southwest Arkansas, and northwest Louisiana ca. 200 B.C.–A.D. 700. However, more recent archaeological data suggest that a number of contemporaneous Late Woodland cultures in and adjacent to East Texas coalesced and/or directly contributed to the development of the Caddo. These 180

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included the Fourche Maline, the peoples of the Lower Mississippi Valley, and the Mossy Grove and Mill Creek cultures of the upper Texas coast and East Texas. Although Bruseth (1998: 63) has argued that the late Fourche Maline cultural tradition included virtually all of the significant precursors (bow and arrow, ceramics, and corn cultivation) necessary for the development of Caddo culture, these attributes were also present in other cultures in adjacent areas at about the same time. It is also important to note that peoples living in what would become the Caddo homeland relied primarily on local resources, suggesting limited social interaction with other groups outside this area. For example, virtually all tools during the Archaic were manufactured from very poor quality local materials. Moreover, lithic material of much better quality is clearly evident in sites from this area during the later Late Woodland Period. The precise developmental sequence for the Caddo remains unclear, but significant changes in the behavior of numerous prehistoric cultures (i.e., Fourche Maline, Lower Mississippi Valley, Mossy Grove, and Mill Creek) began to occur during the Late Woodland Period. Thus, the emergence of a specifically Caddo cultural pattern by approximately A.D. 800 was likely due to increased interaction with adjacent groups as well as to pan–Late Woodland developments in agriculture, new ceramic styles and burial practices, and an increase in mound building and rituals conducted in and around ceremonial architecture. Regardless of its origins, maize was an increasingly important element in the lives of East Texas peoples beginning in approximately A.D. 1100. In general, Caddo culture is characterized by maize agriculture combined with hunting and gathering, large villages/towns, hamlets, farmsteads, large multi-family circular or square houses with thatched roofs, a well-developed ceramic tradition focused on jars and deep bowls, platform mounds with elaborate interments, and participation in a regional cosmology/religion. But it is likely that the introduction of maize served as a catalyst for the development of social complexity, evidenced by corporate monumental works (mound building) at the George C. Davis Site. Although Caddoan ceramics are among the earliest in Central Texas, they occur most frequently at hunter-gatherer sites in areas just east and north of the Edwards Plateau on the Lampasas Cut Plain and on the Blackland Prairie (Shafer 1977, Greer 1976, Perttula 1995, Perttula et al. 2003). As Shafer (2006b) suggests, it is possible that Caddoan groups may have settled in this region, adopted a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, and produced their own ceramics. However, the cultural affiliation of Late Prehistoric II sites containing Caddo or Caddo-like ceramics has been increasingly questioned. Initially, INAA 181

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sourcing conducted on sherds collected from several sites located in and around the Fort Hood Military Reservation on the Lampasas Cut Plain and Blackland Prairie indicated that many Caddo-like ceramics were actually produced in northeast Texas and generally associated with the Sabine and Big Cypress Creek drainage basins along the Red River (Perttula et al. 2003: 59). Recently, however, other sites in this area have yielded Caddo-like ceramics, and INAA studies conducted on sherds from at least one of these sites (41BQ285) found no conclusive match for Caddoan ceramic sources. This suggests that at least some of these Caddo-like ceramics may have been locally produced. The complexity of this situation is compounded by the presence of Toyah lithic assemblages combined with faunal and botanical assemblages, reflecting a very local, but broad, subsistence base at two of these sites. This presents some interesting possibilities in terms of interpretations and modeling. For example, there are at least three likely scenarios that resulted in the archaeology we see today in this area: 1) Caddoan groups settled in the local environment and adopted a broad-spectrum forager lifestyle and a Toyah lithic assemblage, 2) Toyah groups settled here and adopted a Caddo-like ceramic tradition, or 3) local groups adopted the Toyah lithic assemblage and Caddolike ceramic assemblage. Therefore, regardless of whether these ceramics were produced locally or imported, these examples present a microcosm of the complex issues surrounding Late Prehistoric interaction and identity.

InteraCtIon In a mULtI- CULtUraL settIng: ImPLICatIons The development and melding of various cultural traditions imply significant complexity in terms of identity and interaction during the Late Prehistoric. “Simple hunter-gatherers” are not as simple as this unfortunate choice of terms implies. Foraging societies participated in complex and often longdistance social and exchange relationships with other hunter-gatherer groups, as well as with agricultural and/or pastoral populations in other areas and across large regions (Hitchcock and Bartram 1998: 23, Kelly 1995: 187, Welsch and Terrell 1998: 51). Therefore, spatial and temporal differentiation in the deposition of artifacts and features described above has important implications when considering how archaeological cultures evolved across the state. For example, the use-life of artifacts or even the form in which some objects are deposited, particularly portable artifacts (e.g., projectile points), may possess spatial and 182

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temporal distributions far beyond their point of origin or manufacture. Thus, the presence of a specific type of artifact or ecofact in a specific location, particularly in small numbers, may simply reflect the wider social field in which multiple groups participated. For example, although a handful of prehistoric corncobs have been recovered from rockshelters scattered across the Edwards Plateau, the evidence for horticulture in Central Texas remains extremely elusive at best (Harris 1985, Ford 1985, Jelks 1962). But as Johnson points out, corn on the cob is not the most economical manner in which to transport maize ( Johnson 1994: 262). This suggests that corn may have been cultivated on a very limited scale or experimentally in some of these areas. The diagnostic capacity of artifacts as cultural or even temporal indicators from one part of the state to the next must also be carefully considered because of differences in the rate at which technology, practice, and style may be transferred among various groups. It is also likely that the majority of interaction that resulted in the distribution of technology and practice (i.e., the creation of artifacts and features) across Texas occurred through indirect, rather than direct, trade. Along these same lines, the presence of Edwards chert throughout most of the Caddo homeland does not necessarily mean that Central Texas huntergatherer communities extended into East Texas. Similarly, archaeologists and historians often emphasize the densely populated, politically stratified, and agriculturally based character of Caddo society. Particularly, the Caddo’s potential for developing broad, powerful, and well-integrated social, economic, and political networks. However, the presence of Edwards chert in East Texas is not proof that the Caddo carried it there. Although the presence of Edwards chert in East Texas is often implicitly linked to the Caddo’s ability to bring this material into their area, the alternative—that Toyah peoples exported material, technology, and practice—is rarely considered. In fact, the foragers of Central Texas sat atop the richest deposit of tool-grade material in the entire region for millennia. Furthermore, there is far more Edwards chert in East Texas than there are Caddo ceramics in Central Texas and much the same can be said for the distribution of artifacts from areas adjacent to the Edwards Plateau. Thus, the mechanisms by which and even the directions in which specific types of materials and artifacts were distributed is far from clear in Texas, and misconceptions and biases further cloud this issue. Simply framing how the transfer of technologies and ideas occurred can be a daunting and complex task. For example, why or rather how did the bow and arrow spread so quickly—in perhaps one hundred to two hundred 183

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years—throughout virtually all of Texas? To begin, the rapid spread of this technology strongly suggests a relatively well-integrated social field during the early stages of the Late Prehistoric Period. Given the initial similarities between the end of the Late Archaic or Transitional Late Archaic and the early portion of the Late Prehistoric I, perhaps the bow and arrow was transported and/or transmitted along well-established Late Archaic networks. According to Prewitt (1981: 68) and Shafer (1977: 18), the bow and arrow was initially accompanied by little or no immediate change in previous subsistence or settlement patterns in Central and South Texas. This suggests environmental change was not a primary catalyst for its transfer. At least initially, this portion of the Late Prehistoric (ca. A.D. 700–1200) in Central and North Texas is marked instead by a continuation of Late Archaic lifeways (hence the moniker of Neoarchaic) with the addition of the bow and arrow (Prewitt 1981, Prikryl 1990). However, archaeologists (Dillehay 1974, Huebner 1991) did note the scarcity of bison in faunal assemblages in many later Austin Phase sites and this was originally perceived as a decrease in bison throughout most of Texas. Once again, although the role of climate change remained unclear, archaeologists were reluctant to dismiss its significance. More recently, the paucity of bison bone in Austin Phase sites of Central Texas has been questioned on the grounds that this may simply reflect a change in the ways bison were hunted and processed. Dickens and Weiderhold (2003) argue that the adoption of a new hunting technology (i.e., the bow and arrow) introduced a series of changes in hunting and huntingrelated practices, resulting in fewer hunters taking fewer bison at greater distances from residential bases. They propose that during the preceding Archaic Period, the use of the atlatl, or dart thrower, would have been most effective on big game if employed by large numbers of hunters. That is, large groups would position themselves relatively close to the migratory paths of bison herds. They then collectively hunted and processed bison in close proximity to residential base camps, as evidenced by the marked presence of bison bone in faunal assemblages from these sites. Alternatively, Dickens and Weiderhold (2003) argue on the basis of historic and ethnographic data that the adoption of the bow and arrow in the Austin Phase introduced significant improvements in the effectiveness of lone hunters and/or small hunting parties, as well as significant changes in the faunal assemblages. The accuracy and resulting lethalness of the bow and arrow meant large groups were not necessary to kill bison. Instead, a single hunter or small party could go to the game or simply rely on encounter hunting to bring down a bison. 184

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However, this new lethal technology was not accompanied by a technology for transporting the game back to camp. How and, more importantly, how much of the animal actually made it back to the group suddenly became exponentially more complex as hunting parties became smaller and ranged farther afield. In such situations, an animal is generally butchered on-site and the choice cuts of meat are taken back to the residential base. Dickens and Weiderhold (2003) suggest that the total volume of bison transported to residential campsites decreased significantly after the bow and arrow was introduced. In short, most of the animal, particularly bone, would have been left at the kill site/butchering station. Thus, a decrease in bison bone from the faunal assemblages of Late Prehistoric I sites may not indicate that bison were absent or that bison did not figure prominently in the diet of these people. Dickens and Weiderhold’s (2003) model emphasizes the fact that multiple complex factors, beyond environmental change, may be at work. For example, the resumption of more arid conditions after A.D. 1200 (the beginning of the Late Prehistoric II Period) may well have marked an increase in grasslands and a broader distribution of bison throughout the region, as evidenced by an increase of bison in Toyah faunal assemblages. However, the increased frequency of bison observed in Toyah Interval sites may also reflect the gradual development of more efficient bison processing (e.g., jerking) and transportation practices (dog travois). These latter two practices were observed during historic times and it is likely that both activities resulted in increased archaeological visibility of bison hunting and processing. Dickens and Weiderhold (2003) also highlight another contextual issue concerning the archaeology of this time period. In general, there is very little archaeological data from Late Prehistoric I residential base sites compared to other prehistoric periods. Nearly forty years ago, Dillehay (1974) presented a model concerning the presence or absence of bison at different times during Texas prehistory. Based on available data, he suggested that, between A.D. 500 and 1200–1300, bison were not present in large numbers in Central and South Texas. Numerous archaeological investigations have occurred since that time; however, if this model were revisited today and new data were included, there would still be significant gaps in this database. In terms of intensively excavated and reported sites, the number of Austin Phase sites is very small. Even in the broader spatial context of Late Prehistoric I sites in Central Texas, these sites have not been identified with the same frequencies as Late Archaic and Toyah Interval sites. The Archeological Bibliography for the Central Region of Texas, published in 1997 by the Office 185

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of the State Archeologist, shows four entries under Austin Phase and fifteen entries under Late Prehistoric (Simons and Moore 1997: 145, 155–156). There are almost thirty entries for Toyah and fifty-two for the Archaic (Simons and Moore 1997: 167, 144). This represents a significant problem for archaeologists in terms of interpreting culture change through comparative analyses. At least two fundamental issues stem from the comparatively small amount of Late Prehistoric I/Austin Phase data. These issues must be acknowledged if archaeologists are going to use the Austin Phase to distinguish between the Late Archaic Period and the Toyah Interval. First, all differences, as well as similarities, among the Late Archaic, Late Prehistoric I (Austin Phase), and Late Prehistoric II (Toyah) were based on this small sample of Austin Phase sites from a small area, a point that has been largely ignored. Second, it has been implicitly accepted, rather than quantitatively demonstrated, that Late Archaic and Austin Phase lithic technologies in Central and South Texas do not contain technological antecedents to the Toyah lithic assemblage. For example, the Austin Phase lithic assemblage is often described, either implicitly or explicitly, as being based primarily on a bifacial reduction technology (Creel and Goode 1997, Collins 1994, Karbula 2003, Prewitt 1981, Hester 1995). Archaeologists also characterize the division between Toyah and Austin based on bifacial reduction technology (Austin Phase) versus the development of a flake/blade technology, based on a unifacial lithic tradition (Toyah) (Black 1986; Collins 1995; Creel 1990; Creel and Goode 1997; Hester 1995; Johnson 1994, 1997; Prewitt 1981; Quigg and Peck 1995; Shafer 1977; Treece et al. 1993). Initially, these differences were observed at sites located on the South Texas coast, where they were perceived as an in situ technological innovation designed to make more efficient use of scarce local chert (Hester and Shafer 1975: 183). Blade manufacture during the pre-ceramic (Late Prehistoric I or Austin Phase) period was also acknowledged and thus an antecedent to the flake/blade technology of the Toyah lithic assemblage was open to debate (Hester and Shafer 1975: 183). However, shortly after these initial observations, data from several Late Prehistoric I and II sites located on the Blackland Prairie and the Lampasas Cut Plain, constituting the bulk of intensively excavated Late Prehistoric sites at the time, pointed to an abrupt shift away from the bifacial reduction to the unifacial flake/blade technology at the beginning of the Toyah Interval. The shift from bifacial to flake/blade technology observed in this area was viewed as indicative of a broader regional change. The almost implicit acceptance of this perspective throughout the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s reinforced and perpetuated a model of abrupt, widespread, and fundamental techno186

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logical change (Black 1986, Collins 1995, Hester 1995, Johnson 1994, Kelley 1986, Kenmotsu 2001, Prewitt 1981, Ricklis 1992, Shafer 1977). In fact, there are antecedents for the Toyah lithic assemblage in Central Texas during the Austin Interval. Lithic assemblages recovered from Late Prehistoric I sites in Central (41BT105, 41UV86) and South Texas (41VT8) evidence a well-developed flake/blade lithic technology characterized by the production of flake knives and/or trimmed flakes, and blades (Creel and Goode 1997: 232–233, Johnson 1997: 85–87, Shafer 2006: 96–99). Creel and Goode (1997: 233) state that at 41UV86 “[t]he emphasis of knappers, quite clearly, was on making arrow points and simple flake or flake/blade tools for processing animal and plant foods.” At 41BT105, Johnson (1997: 86) notes the absence of “true blades” but states that most knapping debris is represented by billet flakes, despite the low frequency of formal unifacial or bifacial tools. Nevertheless, informal tools, such as edge-modified flakes, are common at the site and bear a striking resemblance to the Late Prehistoric II blade technology reported first at sites located along the Central Texas coast by Hester and Shafer (1975) (Figure 6.2). In addition, Johnson (1997: 159) states that several Scallorn I points (ca. A.D. 900–1150) have “large and irregular flake scars on their blade faces,” and illustrations ( Johnson 1997: 160) show several examples of Scallorn arrow points that were clearly derived from either flakes or blades. This also indicates that Perdiz points (ca. 1300–1700) were not the first clear example of flake-derived arrow points in Central Texas. Quigg and Peck (1995: 19), while acknowledging that blades are often associated with the Toyah Phase, point to sites at O. H. Ivie Reservoir where the full range of biface reduction techniques occurs in the same context with unifaces and projectiles made from blades. Shafer (2006) also documents the presence of blade technology in an Austin component from site 41VT08, located fewer than one hundred miles from the site where he and Hester (1975) first reported evidence of blade technology in 1975. Shafer’s sentiments concerning 41VT08 will no doubt be echoed as more Austin Phase components are intensively excavated: “What was not expected is the prevalence of a prismatic blade technology in the Austin Phase and earlier components” (2006: 97). Together, these examples provide evidence of local antecedents (e.g., Edwards Plateau of Central Texas) for flake/blade technology prior to Toyah and call into question external origins for this tradition. It also seems unlikely that a new lithic technology or innovation should originate outside an area with such rich lithic resources. In fact, given the abundance of chert and the presence of quartzite for hammerstones in and around the Edwards Plateau, 187

fIgUre 6.2 The top two rows are billet and hammerstone flakes with retouched edges from Late Archaic and Late Prehistoric I components at site 41BT105. The bottom two rows are “blades of uncertain Late Prehistoric context” from site 41NU11 (after Johnson 1997: Figures 53 and 54 and Hester and Shafer 1975: Figure 2).

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it seems likely that Central Texas was precisely the place where lithic innovations should occur. These examples also suggest that the differences in lithic technologies between prehistoric periods in Texas may not be as obvious nor as definitive as first perceived. The topic of similarity, rather than difference, between Late Prehistoric I and Late Prehistoric II material cultures has only recently begun to be addressed, but issues concerning continuity have already sparked some debate. For example, some archaeologists characterize the accumulation of firecracked rock on burned rock middens during the Toyah Interval as little more than a veneer. The implication is that substantive accumulation ceased shortly after the Austin Phase because Toyah peoples shifted to bison hunting (Collins 1994: 157–166, Ricklis 1994: 294–296, Collins and Ricklis 1998: 25). Nonetheless, focused research, combined with more recent intensive as well as extensive investigations (Black and Creel 1997, 1998; Mauldin et al. 2003; Nickels et al. 2003; Treece et al. 1993), shows that burned rock middens were in continuous use from Archaic times into the early Historic Period. Again, this suggests greater continuity than was heretofore assumed. This review of the Late Prehistoric Period presents a complex, diverse, and dynamic regional picture of material culture. Archaeological data from some portions of Texas indicate a change in material culture every one hundred to two hundred years. It is difficult to determine whether this was due to environmental or human-induced conditions or if groups perished, migrated, or were absorbed by neighboring peoples. Nevertheless, all these scenarios imply both significant interaction among various peoples throughout the region as well as the persistence, transformation, and establishment of new sociocultural identities. Although it is true that the sheer size of Texas provides an excellent opportunity to investigate material cultures on a regional scale, it also presents significant challenges. Similarly, these data demonstrate significant variation and also suggest evidence of similarity and continuity from the Late Archaic into the Late Prehistoric II Period. Johnson (1994: 277) characterizes the precipitous and widespread manifestation of Toyah material culture thusly: “It appears full-blown as if sprung from the brow of Zeus.” His point, that region-wide antecedents for Toyah material culture are not immediately apparent or particularly clear, cannot be emphasized enough. Toyah material culture does not present a straightforward developmental sequence. Instead, Toyah is characterized by an almost simultaneous manifestation throughout the region that some say can only be explained by direct external influence, people or bison. 189

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However, it is only recently that enough data were acquired to begin to address local, much less foreign, antecedents for the development of Toyah material culture. Similarly, we have just begun to broaden the scale of investigation to encompass all of the cultures influencing the development of Toyah. Nonetheless, these efforts represent a new stage in the field of Toyah studies begun more than sixty years ago by Kelley (1947). Chapter 7 focuses specifically on the perceptions and concepts surrounding Toyah archaeology.

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toya h a rC h a e o Lo g y Material, Geographic Distribution, and the Concept of Toyah Culture

I

n recent years, archaeologists have fundamentally changed their conceptualization of the range of Toyah material culture. As Kenmotsu (2001: 35) points out, Kelley (1947) originally envisioned Toyah as encompassing virtually all of South, Central, and TransPecos Texas and parts of northern Mexico. This enormous range was based, at least in part, on the broad distribution of Perdiz points. Although the specific artifacts that distinguish Toyah remain largely unchanged since J. Charles Kelley defined them in 1947, its range and the emphasis on Perdiz as a diagnostic indicator of Toyah per se has diminished. As the number of archaeological investigations increase, the frequency and distribution with which Perdiz points are found suggest that Perdiz is not a particularly useful diagnostic for determining the boundaries of a specific cultural group or defining a specific hunting practice. For example, Perdiz points have been documented in cairn burials in northeast Chihuahua (Mallouf 1987), rockshelters in southern Coahuila (Taylor 1968), the dunes of Padre Island (Scurlock et al. 1974), and the Caddo villages of East Texas (Perttula and Bruseth 1998). This distribution encompassed hunter-gatherers, desert farmers as well as those of the Pineywoods, the fisher folk of the coast, and most everyone in between. This strongly suggests that Perdiz arrow points were not directly associated with any one specific community or marriage/cultural/linguistic group (nor a specific tribe or ethnic group) or that Perdiz was representative of a specialized tool kit for procuring and processing a single species that occurred in a specific habitat. If Perdiz is not diagnostic of any specific group identity or any particular subsistence or technological practice, other than killing game and people, what does it represent? In fact, when compared with game animals, the frequency and distribution of the Perdiz point most closely approximates the frequency and distribution of white-tailed deer in Texas. White-tailed deer

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are distributed across most of North and Central America. However, some portions of Central Texas, particularly the Llano Basin, have been characterized as exhibiting “the highest density of white-tailed deer of any area of similar size in North America” (Teer 1984: 265). In Texas, the density of white-tailed deer is greatest on the Edwards Plateau and in South Texas and drops off significantly in adjacent areas (Cook 1984: 460). The highest frequency of Perdiz arrow points corresponds to these areas, and beyond their frontiers, both the frequency of Perdiz points and the density of white-tailed deer diminish. The diet of white-tailed deer in Central and South Texas varies between browsing and grazing, but they prefer woody plants and forbs, particularly the young fresh growth and tender shoots, as well as mast (acorns, nuts, and fruit) (Cook 1984: 467). White-tailed deer do not generally live in large herds, preferring small social groups (one buck and three or four does) that browse within a small range. Marchinton and Hirth (1984: 130) documented the home range of deer in some areas of South Texas at approximately 175 acres. These data indicate that, despite variable environmental conditions, the Edwards Plateau and South Texas are quite amenable to small localized populations of deer focused on a diverse diet that includes oak, pecan, mesquite, wild plum trees, and some grasses. In contrast, bison are grazing herd animals requiring immense grasslands capable of sustaining hundreds, thousands, and even millions of animals. Large herd size and the demand for grass require constant movement to fresh pastures as well as seasonal migrations. Although Perdiz points are found in some grasslands, these areas were not always contiguous and their size, like the range of bison herds, likely varied from year to year. Historical accounts from the seventeenth through the nineteenth centuries also indicate that the annual migration routes of bison varied (Wade 2002). However, white-tailed deer and many other types of small game do not migrate and can be found across most of Texas. This suggests that Perdiz points reflect a subsistence base in which individuals or small groups opportunistically hunted small to medium-sized game, rather than participating in large group hunts focused on bison. Other aspects of the Toyah lithic assemblage also suggest a similar pattern. Although it seems unlikely that beveled knives were used to skin rabbits, they would have been extremely helpful in harvesting and processing some types of large plants, particularly the large bulbs of some geophytes such as sotol. End scrapers are extremely useful for scraping a variety of different hides and the flake/blade technology appears to be an expedient way to make a number of different types of tools suitable for a broad range of foraging needs. There is no way to escape the fact that Perdiz points and the Toyah lithic 192

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assemblage crosscut a number of different biotic zones and peoples. Therefore, it seems likely that the ubiquitous presence of Perdiz points and, to a lesser extent, the Toyah lithic assemblage is due more to their widespread utility for hunting and processing a variety of species across diverse environmental zones than to their use for a single species. The broad distribution of Toyah material culture is still acknowledged, but Toyah sites are now recognized primarily by open campsites containing specific lithic and ceramic assemblages from an increasingly narrower and welldefined range in Central and South Texas (Black 1986, Creel 1990, Hester 1995, Jelks 1962, Johnson 1994, Lintz et al. 1993, Quigg 1997, Quigg and Peck 1995, Ricklis and Collins 1994, Suhm 1957, Treece et al. 1993). Some archaeologists (Creel 1990, Johnson 1994) also include burned rock features, as well as mussel shell concentrations (mussel shell features), as representative of the Toyah material culture. Johnson (1994), recognizing the broad distribution of Toyah artifacts as well as some differentiation within the region, sought to assemble a “behavioral collage,” rather than a trait list, to illustrate what Toyah life was like: By culture I mean more than inanimate tools and their characteristic manufacturing debris. I also mean specific knowledge and habits, whether such knowledge was held universally or shared by only some Toyah societies. The culture of a people includes specific preferences for certain foods and raw materials—plant, animal, and mineral; given ways of moving about the landscape to acquire and use those resources; a preferred social structure or way of living together in groups; and given means of making and using specific forms of tools, containers, shelters, etc. ( Johnson 1994: 242)

The Buckhollow Site (41KM16), located on the Edwards Plateau in Kimble County at the confluence of Copperas Creek and the North Llano River, provides the type-site example of Johnson’s “Classic Toyah Culture.” This site revealed lithic, ceramic, and faunal assemblages consistent with those described above and site structure and patterning (features and activity areas) that indicated several family groups lived, hunted, and processed bison, deer, and antelope at this location between approximately A.D. 1300 and 1500 ( Johnson 1994: 283). Site features included several stone-lined hearths, a possible brush-walled windbreak, and discrete activity areas evidenced by debris patterns of mussel shell, bone, potsherds, and tools (utilized flakes, scrapers, and perforators), representing “secondary butchering and carving stations (as opposed to field butchering), flint knapping stations, and the processing and discard of mussels” ( Johnson 1994: 264). 193

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Johnson (1994: 263) also suggests that Classic Toyah communities were composed of several small nuclear families. Although the presence of families at Buckhollow is generally acknowledged, the number of people who resided in this community remains open for debate. Nevertheless, most archaeologists (Black 1986, Collins 1995, Creel 1990, Hester 1995, Johnson 1994, Quigg and Peck 1995, Ricklis 1996) agree that there is a strong correlation between the relative abundance of various resources (e.g., plants, animals, water, fuel) within the community range and the size, distribution, duration of stay, and function of sites. Thus, Buckhollow represents a specific location (e.g., a residential base camp) within the community range where several families aggregated to take advantage of particularly abundant resources found at that location during a specific time of the year. The band of people who lived at the Buckhollow Site may have also inhabited other similarly sized large residential bases within the community range during different seasons or perhaps just this one. Alternatively, at other times of the year, the community likely dispersed across the range and lived in smaller groups, perhaps as a single family, at smaller sites in order to target more dispersed resources. As Hester (1981) points out, both resource density and abundance varies in South Texas throughout the year and across the landscape according to the vagaries of climate and seasonal cycles. Significant seasonal variation in resources has also been observed in Central Texas. Ellis et al. (1995) argue that relatively minor climatic fluctuations in Central Texas could result in dramatically different combinations of concentrated and/or dispersed resources throughout the entire area. Perhaps the most significant factor for most living things in this region is the seasonal fluctuation in precipitation. During the dry season and periods of drought, the productivity of plant forage can decrease dramatically along with the output of springs and the number of running streams. Although this situation may increase the foraging range of animals, including humans, it may also result in the concentration of plants and animals around the most dependable water sources (Taylor 1964). Thus, residential bases in Central and South Texas are often found along major drainages in precisely the locations where people—as well as plants, animals, and water—are most concentrated. River bottoms and terraces in many parts of Texas offer the additional bonus of large stands of nut-bearing native pecan trees (Hall 1998, 2000). Given the strong case made for fatand carbohydrate-rich foods (particularly linoleic fatty acid) in forager diets (Kelly 1995, Speth and Spielman 1983), and the high carbohydrate and fat 194

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(particularly linoleic fatty acid) content in pecans (Hall 2000: 110), groves of pecan trees would have been an exceptional fixed resource. Similar fixed seasonal fatty plant resources, such as mongongo nuts, were also documented as a primary resource among hunter-gatherer groups in similar environmental settings (Kelly 1995). These types of carbohydrateand fat-rich resources are particularly important in the diets of pregnant and nursing mothers for the development of the brain in both prenatals and infants. Mussel shell is also ubiquitous in many archaeological sites in these settings, and recent research into the nutritional value of saltwater mussels indicates that they are excellent sources of Vitamin C, riboflavin, folate, Vitamin B12, iron, and calcium (Tuttle 2010). These vitamins and minerals are also important for mothers, children, and the elderly. Although saltwater mussels may not be directly comparable to freshwater mussels, this research suggests another previously ignored, significant nutritional source. Archaeologists, particularly Hall (1998, 2000), also emphasize the nutritional significance of pecans and the correlation in the close proximity of dense pecan groves and large sites in river and stream valleys. Direct comparison between the fat content of bison and pecan meat also indicates that pecans may meet and/or exceed the fat content of bison (Hall 2000, Speth and Spielman 1983). These data suggest prehistoric foragers in Texas incorporated pecan groves into their seasonal round in much the same way as twentiethcentury hunter-gatherers harvested mongongo nuts in sub–Saharan Africa. Precipitation, rainfall, and groundwater in Central and South Texas are generally more plentiful in the east than in the west. Temperatures in these areas are generally associated with seasonal changes, but dramatic fluctuations in temperature are not uncommon in Texas. Canadian cold fronts move south across the Great Plains virtually unimpeded and can drop temperatures as much as 50 degrees Fahrenheit in just a few hours. In the summer, high pressure systems may remain over the region for weeks at a time, resulting in long heat waves with temperatures exceeding 100 degrees Fahrenheit. However, in general, mean annual temperature throughout the region is oriented north to south and, to a lesser extent, along elevation clines (Figure 7.1). Thus, large residential sites are frequently found in sheltered locations in or near pecan groves along perennial water sources in rich riparian environments. In addition to water and shade in the summer, lower elevations in stream valleys offer some shelter from bitter winter winds. In western portions of Central and South Texas, plants and animals are often concentrated in these locations due to the limited availability of water. However, as one moves east, annual precipitation increases significantly (see Figure 7.1) and 195

fIgUre 7.1 Annual precipitation, depicting east-to-west trends in Texas rainfall patterns (redrawn from Texas Parks and Wildlife Department), and mean annual temperature in Fahrenheit, depicting north-to-south trends in Texas temperatures (Griffiths and Orton 1968).

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the drop in elevation from west to east also contributes to more water by volume in streams and rivers, as well as an increased frequency of springs. The landscape becomes increasingly more wooded and dissected and plant and animal communities are generally denser (Huebner 1991: 354). One resource found throughout most of the Classic Toyah area that does not fluctuate significantly in terms of abundance is chert. Edwards chert occurs in both veins and nodules and is also found in the gravels of streams draining the Edwards Plateau. Thus, chert would have been readily accessible to prehistoric peoples in Central Texas. To a lesser extent, this was also true in South Texas, where chert gravels are the predominate source for lithic material. Although the size of the gravels somewhat limits the size of the tools produced, the gravels nonetheless present a consistent and high-quality source for tool material. Thus, groups occupying these areas, particularly those on and adjacent to the Edwards Plateau, were in an excellent position to exploit lithic resources for the purpose of extending their social networks. As mentioned above, the modern population of white-tailed deer is greater in Texas than in any other state (Rue 1978: 22, Teer 1984: 265). In some portions of the Edwards Plateau, such as the Llano Basin, the density has been documented at 121 deer per square mile (Rue 1978: 6). Faunal assemblages from sites throughout the Toyah region clearly demonstrate that deer were a mainstay in the prehistoric human diet. Other than terrestrial snail shell (rabdotus) and freshwater mussel shell (numerous species), deer bone is the most ubiquitous species in archaeological sites throughout prehistory. Unlike bison, deer tend to range over a fixed area (similar to people) and thus represent a steady and somewhat predictable resource. Despite some abundance in this environment, its unpredictable character served to temper or condition what Johnson (1994) called “Toyah Culture.” Therefore, any model of Toyah sociocultural identity should be framed in terms of flexibility and mobility consistent with the ethnographic data for broad-spectrum foragers (Binford 1980, Kelly 1995, Lightfoot 1983, Yellen 1977). Archaeologically, we might expect to see several different site types within the range of a single community varying in size and function depending on the season, whether or not the community was aggregated or dispersed, and the specific resources present at that location. Nevertheless, the data presented above suggests residential bases would tend to be large in terms of area (due to group aggregation), would contain dense concentrations of artifacts (due to repeated occupations), and would be located close to dense and reliable food and water sources (since it must support a comparatively large number of people). In addition to their larger size, residential base camps should also evi197

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dence a wide range of activities and practices, repeated Toyah occupations, and, perhaps, even occupation dating to other prehistoric periods due to the suitability of the location for human occupation. All of the aspects suggest that residential base camps may remain popular site locations for many generations. (As realtors say, “location, location, location.”) Alternatively, other campsites would be smaller in size and contain less dense artifact concentrations, as well as evidence of more specialized activities, such as plant harvesting and/or processing sites, kill sites, butchering stations, lithic acquisition sites, or observation posts. At least three significant points can be made with respect to residential base camps and the distribution of materials found there during the Late Prehistoric Period II or Toyah Interval. First, residential sites in different environmental settings across Texas often share various combinations of similar attributes (artifact types, features, and functions). Second, the distribution of open campsites possessing only the Toyah material culture defined above appears to be focused in Central Texas, primarily on the Edwards Plateau, and northern and central portions of South Texas (Arnn 2007, Ricklis and Collins 1994, Creel 1990, Johnson 1994, Karbula 2003, Kibler 2005, Quigg and Peck 1995, Treece et al. 1993). Third, all areas bordering Johnson’s (1994) Classic Toyah Area possess some artifacts or features of Toyah material culture. These points are rarely considered in great detail during discussions concerning the distribution of Toyah material culture. For example, all areas south, east, and west of this region and many areas to the north exhibit burned rock and mussel shell features, as well as all or part of the Toyah lithic assemblage. The material culture of open campsites in immediately adjacent areas often differs only in the type of ceramic assemblages observed. As Greer pointed out almost forty years ago, such sites “do not necessarily indicate a Toyah focus occupation. . . . Perhaps the best focus (or phase) designation for such a site at present would be a simple ‘unknown’” (Greer 1976: 154). This is certainly true for sites immediately north and east of the Edwards Plateau, which often possess the Toyah lithic assemblage along with Caddo or Caddo-like ceramics. On the Lampasas Cut Plain and the Blackland Prairie, it is still relatively common to hear archaeologists say they are working on a “Toyah site” when, in fact, they are excavating a component containing a Toyah lithic assemblage and a Caddo ceramic assemblage. In such cases, the popular use of the term “Toyah” indicates little more than temporal affinity (i.e., very late prehistory or Prehistoric II Period). Alternatively, Shafer (2006b) suggests that sites on the Lampasas Cut Plain and the Blackland Prairie possessing mixed assemblages of Toyah and Caddo or Caddo-like artifacts are, in fact, western outliers of Caddo bison 198

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hunters from East Texas. However, some of these sites are located more than one hundred miles from prehistoric Caddo settlements in East Texas and several seventeenth-century accounts documented non–Caddo groups living and hunting bison in portions of the Lampasas Cut Plain and the Blackland Prairie, some of whom were enemies of the Tejas Alliance (Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado). However, Shafer’s “Prairie Caddo” model represents one of the few recent attempts to address sociocultural identity in the prehistoric record of Texas. Ricklis (1990, 1996) also points to linkages between prehistoric and historic groups on the Central Texas coast. Prehistoric sites possessing both the Toyah lithic assemblage and the distinctive Rockport ceramic assemblage are referred to as “Rockport Phase,” rather than Toyah, and are considered ancestral to historic Karankawa culture groups. In the Trans-Pecos area, the Cielo Complex, known for its curious stacked stone circular structures, is also recognized by a primarily Toyah lithic assemblage and the absence of ceramics, but it too has its own specific moniker (Mallouf 1990, 1999). Thus, there is no question that the distribution of Toyah artifacts was widespread throughout the region. However, sites possessing the whole Toyah material assemblage, with a minimum of other (exotic) material culture (Caddo, Rockport, and/or Puebloan ceramics, as well as other projectile points), appear to be concentrated in Central Texas and the northern and central portions of South Texas. Moreover, the frequency of these pure Toyah sites dissipates as one approaches the frontiers or outer edges of these areas. Viewed in this light, the geographic distribution of Toyah material culture appears to radiate out from Central Texas, a concept entirely opposed to most Toyah models that suggest that Toyah was imported into Central Texas from elsewhere. Nevertheless, given the antecedents for Toyah lithic technology on the Edwards Plateau, the evidence for a very long tradition of broad-spectrum foraging in Central Texas, and the general paucity of data for comparative analysis from the period preceding Toyah, it seems likely that Toyah was the result of continuous in situ developments combined with some external influences. It is also likely that the Toyah region, perhaps even the Classic Toyah Culture Area, consisted of many distinct culture groups. This may explain, in part, why “Toyah” sites often contain the Toyah lithic assemblage coupled with non–Toyah ceramic assemblage (e.g., Caddo, Puebloan, or Karankawa ceramics). This is clearly evident in sites farther away from the Edwards Plateau and generally supports Johnson’s (1994) definition of the Shared Toyah Area. Focusing on residential sites that evidence the most similar artifact classes, 199

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types, decorative styles, and features can narrow the geographic range of communities that may be considered part of the same social aggregate and/or marriage/linguistic group. Once defined, the material culture of these communities can be compared to surrounding communities. Chapter 8 applies these various dimensions of hunter-gatherer identity to Toyah data.

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hapter 7 presents archaeological evidence that all areas surrounding the Classic Toyah Culture Area possessed distinct, but overlapping, material cultures (Figure 8.1). Moreover, these data also suggest this was true for at least seventeen hundred years prior to the Toyah Interval. Archival data also indicate that this region was peopled by numerous distinct sociocultural identities described variously as bands, tribes, marriage groups, ethnic groups, and naciones (Arnn 2007; Boyd 1997, 2001; Kenmotsu 2001; Ricklis 1996; Solberger 1978; Turpin 1995; Wade 2001, 2003). These data, along with ethnographic and environmental information, present an enduring, flexible, and superbly adaptable forager tradition practiced by numerous culturally distinct groups. A fundamental aspect of this tradition was the construction and maintenance of identities and relationships at multiple temporal and spatial scales that, initially, facilitated local, area, and regional interaction in order to mitigate the capricious effects of a variable environmental setting. This chapter addresses how these various temporal and spatial scales of identity and interaction are reflected in the archaeological record.

three fUndamentaL sCaLes of soCIoCULtUraL IdentIty Archaeologically, the most fundamental unit of sociocultural identity, the one from which all other cultural identities stem, is the band or community. The band is represented spatially by several sites with various functions located within a range or territory. Chief among these sites is the residential base camp. Residential bases tend to be larger than most other site types (due to band aggregation), to contain dense concentrations and whole assemblages of artifacts (due to repeated occupations by a broad demographic sample of

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fIgUre 8.1 Regional cultural identities surrounding the Toyah region (Arnn 2007).

the community), and to be located close to dense and reliable resources (e.g., food and water). Residential bases evidence repeated occupations within the same component, and these sites may also contain multiple components from other periods. The band/community/residential base corresponds to the most local and immediate temporal span in which brief, but repeated, occupations occurred for a few weeks or months during the year. A marriage group consists of several adjacent bands/communities that generally share the same language and similar subsistence and settlement patterns due to their close proximity and familial ties. The intimate and intense degree of interaction within a marriage group is a powerful conduit for the transmission and application of similar ideas, practices, and technologies, as well as for their reification beyond the community. Thus, the archaeological correlates of a marriage group should be evident in similar artifact styles, classes, assem202

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blages, and features, as well as the materials from which they were produced. Moreover, this pattern of similarity should be visible in numerous residential bases encompassing several community ranges across an area perhaps several hundred or even thousands of square kilometers in size. A marriage group also reflects the reproduction of language, kinship, and other cultural traits over several generations in a specific area and therefore may represent greater temporal continuity and greater archaeological visibility than a single band/ local community. The social field represents hunter-gatherer interaction at its broadest spatial extent. The term “social field” is intended to convey the historically and situationally specific potential of a particular place (region) and time (perhaps several hundred years) in terms of people, practices, resources, ideas, and technologies. Any region may be considered dormant until local communities and marriage groups place themselves within larger social networks and construct identities to maintain those relationships across the region. The archaeological correlates of this interaction and the identities involved are reflected in both the distribution of exotic artifacts, exemplifying differential long-distance exchange with distant “others,” and the broader distribution of common artifacts (e.g., a projectile point style). These networks also provide opportunities for interaction in which individuals and groups can discard, transform, and/or adopt identities and thus share bounty as well as risk at multiple temporal and spatial scales (Roseberry 1998: 81).

dIstIngUIshIng regIonaL IdentIty: the toyah soCIaL fIeLd A social field, even when viewed strictly as an “economic risk-sharing network” (see McBrinn 2005), will often span several hundred years, many groups, and vast distances in a manner not unlike a regional climatic pattern. However, despite an initial emphasis on long-distance risk management— due, perhaps, to a specific climatic regime—the focus of interaction in a social field is likely to broaden and take on a life of its own. Transformation is implicit when numerous individuals and groups in a region participate with varying degrees of intensity over hundreds of years in a wide range of relationships with other people, goods, technologies, and information. Therefore, a variety of interactions (trade networks, political alliances, fictive kin systems, and religious sects) and identities may be evident over hundreds of years and tens of thousands of square kilometers. However, the size, diversity, and in203

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herent change associated with social fields can make distinguishing the specific artifacts indicative of their identity and sphere of interaction difficult. If the distinct practices and the resulting material culture of a band/community blur somewhat as social interaction expands outward into the marriage group, this attenuating effect becomes more pronounced at the regional scale of a social field. Nevertheless, individuals, bands, and groups participating in these networks often select, either consciously or unconsciously, a common element to symbolize participation in a broader sphere of interaction. Archaeologically, such a symbol should present an extremely broad spatial and temporal distribution. It should also be widely applicable in daily use, made from materials available throughout the region, portable, stylistically different, and readily distinguishable from similar artifacts outside the social field. Given the initial environmental impetus for establishing long-distance networks, it may also be useful to correlate the spatial and temporal distribution of specific artifacts with some aspect of the regional environment. In addition, the disappearance of a particularly pervasive artifact may suggest fundamental changes in the conditions that generated these networks (e.g., drastic population decline, widespread cultural dissolution, and, of course, climatic change). The archaeological correlate of regional social interaction during the Toyah Interval is the Perdiz arrow point. Although several contemporaneous, but morphologically distinct, arrow points occur in areas immediately adjacent to and within the Classic and Shared Toyah areas combined, Perdiz points occur with far more frequency than any other Late Prehistoric II point style in this region as a whole. Nevertheless, these other arrow points demonstrate the existence, use, and functional adequacy of other types. Morphological variation in Perdiz arrow points is frequently noted; however, it is also true that Perdiz points from widely separated areas often demonstrate remarkable similarity. Furthermore, the combination of size (slightly larger than most coeval points) and shape (deeply barbed shoulders and contracting stem) also distinguish Perdiz from other contemporaneous arrow points. In addition, all other contemporaneous points can be made from a Perdiz point, but an average-sized Perdiz point cannot be fashioned from these various smaller arrow points. Thus, this subtle combination of size and shape effectively prohibits the use of contemporaneous arrow points to produce Perdiz points. This suggests that all Perdiz points were purposefully made with this specific point style in mind. Although the Perdiz arrow point is generally viewed as the single most diagnostic artifact of Toyah, its distribution represents neither an identifiable 204

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fIgUre 8.2 Regional distribution of Perdiz point external to the Shared and Classic Toyah Areas (after Johnson 1994: Figure 105).

culture group nor any specific subsistence or technological practice beyond broad-spectrum foraging (Figure 8.2). Thus, its chief diagnostic attribute is now viewed as a temporal marker for the Late Prehistoric II Period. However, dates from several Toyah components in the Classic Toyah Area show that these sites were occupied well into the Historic Period. Furthermore, the recovery of metal and glass arrow points resembling Perdiz points suggests at least some continuity of the Perdiz style into the early Historic Period. Similarly, despite Texas archaeologists’ predilection for studying projectile points, little or no correlation has been drawn between metric analyses and the meaning of various point styles. Nevertheless, most Texas archaeologists will concede that due to their broad spatial distribution and considerable morphological variation, Perdiz points were not made by a single group 205

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of people. Therefore, it is reasonable to infer that, beyond wear and reuse, at least some of this metric variation may be stylistic and may reflect distinct groups of people. Although it is likely that many, if not most, aspects of sociocultural identity were demonstrated through less durable artifacts (i.e., arrow shafts, clothing, even tattoos), several anthropologists (Stark 1998, Wiessner 1983, Yellen 1977) have offered good reasons why a group of hunter-gatherers would want to be able to discern their projectile points from others. Perhaps most importantly, the distribution of a specific type of projectile point may reflect who hunted in a specific area or territory and, unlike perishable markers, stone points are capable of doing this in perpetuity. Most hunter-gatherer territorial boundaries were more or less permeable, but the right to hunt in other territories was negotiated, could at times be hotly contested, and always taken seriously. This was particularly true in marginal environments or regions where environmental conditions and resources fluctuated significantly. Wiessner (1983) notes that among the Basarwa subtle but nonetheless distinct differences in the design of metal points belonging to various bands could be discerned by individuals. Interestingly, when hunters of one band were asked to distinguish between their points and those of an immediately adjacent group, their ability to distinguish between the two was not particularly good. However, the farther away a group lived, the more precise hunters became in distinguishing whether a point was theirs or that of a different group. This ethnographic example generally supports the inference that the closest interaction among peoples living in a region is often with their immediate neighbors. Moreover, this example demonstrates that at least some hunter-gatherers used projectile points (actual arrowheads) to communicate sociocultural identity across space and through time. It also seems likely that Wiessner’s account is not an isolated case. However, numerous studies focusing on the metric analysis of projectile points in Texas—some specifically on Perdiz points ( Johnson 1994, Mallouf 1987)—have discerned no correlation between morphology and a specific area or group of people. In fact, Perdiz points appear to be rather simple (nonsuperfluous) in design, resembling a Christmas tree, generally made on a flake or blade with notches, barbs, and a contracting stem. Most Perdiz points, perhaps 85 percent, have a fairly well-defined dorsal or ventral side and may be considered primarily unifacial, while the rest are, essentially, bifacial. Within this narrow morphological range, the options for demonstrating difference or similarity (identity) are rather limited and, one would assume, simple to detect. This author is not a lithic analyst and thus the approach to stylistic variation presented is admittedly unsophisticated, but the question 206

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fIgUre 8.3 Depictions of the specific attributes of asymmetrical (A) and symmetrical (B) Perdiz projectile points, as well as various aspects of the point style, including dorsal and ventral aspects, barb, stem, and stem-barb notch (after Johnson 1994: Figure 38).

asked was this: How could similarity or difference be designed into such a simple projectile point and, yet, incur only minimal alteration throughout the point’s use-life? In fact, most of the defining elements (i.e., extremities) of the Perdiz point—including the point, stem, and barbs—would have changed over time due to breakage and/or resharpening. Given these limited parameters, the only aspect of design that would have remained relatively intact (in comparison to the point, barbs, or stem) throughout the use-life of this point is the stem-barb notch located on either side of the central axis and at the nexus of the point, barbs, and stem (Figure 8.3). Therefore, marking difference or similarity in the stem-barb notches of Perdiz points would ensure the greatest duration for any sort of identity fixed within them. Given the simplicity of design, about the only way to differentiate one stem-barb notch from another on the same point is to make them 207

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asymmetrical. One could also demonstrate greater variation by making the higher or lower stem-barb notch correspond to the dorsal or ventral side of the point—making, essentially, a right-handed or left-handed Perdiz point. Thus, unifacial Perdiz points possess greater potential for variation with three possible combinations, whereas bifacial Perdiz can reflect only symmetry or asymmetry. However, to date no study has measured or even observed bilateral symmetry and/or asymmetry in the stem-barb notches of Perdiz points, much less their relationship to the dorsal and/or ventral aspects of the point face. Similarly, no study has used these measurements to compare Perdiz points from various sites across Texas to determine if specific types of asymmetry and/or symmetry correspond to specific geographic areas. In fact, there may have been no conscious intent on the part of prehistoric knappers to present difference or similarity (sociocultural identity) in their projectile points. This is because practice, particularly daily practice, is often structured at a subconscious level. Hence, people do things in the same manner seemingly because they “have always done it that way,” which is consistent with anthropological theory (see Bourdieu 1977 and 1990) and at least some lithic analysis in Texas (Hudler 2003: 346–347). In short, behavioral patterning resulting in the circumscribed distribution of a specifically modified artifact type need not be a purposeful conscious act, but it may, nevertheless, reflect a specific territorial boundary and/or sociocultural identity. The tedious topic of Perdiz point metric analysis emphasizes the significance of ignoring variation in the archaeological record. More importantly, it demonstrates how ignoring variation can affect our interpretations and understanding of material culture. Although it may seem reasonable from a functionalist perspective to assume that prehistoric knappers wanted to make symmetrical points (perhaps based on a notion that the more precise the symmetry, the more optimal the performance of the arrow), such a hypothesis should be tested before it is implicitly accepted. In fact, arrows are generally launched with such velocity and at such close range that they require little more than a bit of sharp material on the business end to effectively pierce flesh and kill or injure a living target. Furthermore, ethnographic accounts, as well as curated ethnographic collections—such as the good collection at Texas Archaeological Research Laboratory (TARL) at the University of Texas at Austin—demonstrate that arrow points require considerably less sophistication in terms of material, workmanship, and precision than that exhibited by most Perdiz points. Therefore, after considering and eliminating purely functional aspects of design technology, we are still 208

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left with the question of why so many people went to the trouble of crafting this specific style of point. Once tested, the symmetry and/or asymmetry of Perdiz points may prove to be insignificant in terms of identity and interaction. Nevertheless, the Perdiz arrow point remains unique among its contemporaries, representing one of the most quantifiably and morphologically distinct projectile points of the Late Prehistoric Period. The consistency and specificity of design, its general utility, and broad spatial and temporal distribution, compared with other arrow point types in the same region at the same time, all indicate intentional construction, reproduction, and maintenance of some type of a specific identity beyond the scale of a single community or marriage group. In a sense, each new Perdiz point may have represented a freshly minted piece of regional social currency, signaling membership or at least participation in a field of other communities, marriage groups, and networks. Thus, the Perdiz arrow point may be viewed as a subtle, but pervasive emblem of regional prehistoric identity. Although the distribution of the Toyah lithic assemblage is not as widespread as the Perdiz point, it too may serve as a marker of this social field, albeit to a lesser temporal and spatial extent. There were no doubt other markers of this social field, but few as durable and portable as the Perdiz point. For example, the tattoos of the Jumano and Caddo, as well as other groups living in the region during the early Colonial Period, likely communicated something about the individual (e.g., marriage/linguistic group, community, and perhaps the various networks in which the person participated). Nevertheless, the Perdiz point appears to be the most durable and widespread indication of interaction and, thus, participation in a social field.

dIstIngUIshIng IdentItIes WIthIn a regIon: toyah as mULtIPLe marrIage/ LIngUIstIC/CULtUre groUPs The increasing number of intensively excavated Late Prehistoric II sites located along the boundaries of the Classic Toyah Area (Figure 8.4) permits archaeologists to observe, compare, and contrast various areas and their material cultures. This work is beginning to provide evidence of smaller social aggregates, such as marriage groups, within this region. Here, several clusters of archaeologically similar sites mirror the spatial distribution of at least some historic marriage/linguistic groups. These data present a pluralistic cultural 209

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fIgUre 8.4 Distribution of Late Prehistoric II sites containing mixed assemblages along the boundary of the Classic Toyah Area (after Johnson 1994: Figure 105).

setting that increasingly calls into question the cultural uniformity of Toyah identity in both the General and Classic areas. For example, Smith (1996) documents several Caddo ceramic sherds (Canton and Maybelle incised) and arrow points (Alba arrow points) occurring with Perdiz points, scrapers, and bison bone at the Rodeo Hill and Third Dam sites in the Central Brazos Valley of north Central Texas. Similar “Toyah” components from several sites (41BL23, 41CV41, 41CV48, 41CV344, 210

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41HI1, 41TV42, 41HM51) located on the Blackland Prairie and the Lampasas Cut Plain (in the vicinity of Fort Hood) possess Caddo ceramics, and sherds from some sites (41HI1, 41TV42, 41HM51) consist almost entirely of Caddo ceramics (Greer 1976, Jelks 1962, Johnson 1994, Kibler and Broehm 2005, Suhm 1957). However, it remained unclear if these ceramics were locally made copies of Caddo wares or were imported from the east. Stylistic and compositional analyses (petrography and INAA) of ceramics dating between A.D. 1200– 1700 from various sites (41BL23, 41CV41, 41CV48, 41CV344, 41HI105, 41ML46, 41WM71) in the Fort Hood area now suggest most were produced in East and Northeast Texas (Perttula et al. 2003). Farther south along the Colorado River in Fayette County, site 41FY135 contained the complete Toyah lithic assemblage, bison bone, and mussel shell, as well as several Cuney arrow points commonly found in East Texas, bone-tempered/sandy paste, and sandy paste sherds (Kalter et al. 2005). Ceramic analyses and intersite comparison with ten other sites were also conducted and included two sites from the Fort Hood study (41BL23, 41WM437) and three from the Classic Toyah Culture Area (41KM16, 41JW8, 41BX228). Although Toyah lithic and faunal assemblages were present and bone temper was evidenced in some sherds, ceramic analyses and comparisons with ceramics from the sites in the Classic Toyah Area and from two Fort Hood sites show significant differences. According to Kalter et al., “the site’s pottery most closely resembles the sandy paste and bone temper wares found at sites 41FY74 and 41GM281, located on the Post Oak Savannah, the Allens Creek sites on the Inland Coastal Plain, and 41BO79 on the Upper Texas Coast” (Kalter et al. 2005: 215–216). In short, ceramics from 41FY135 were found to be most similar to local sites or sites located downstream on or toward the coastal plain rather than the Classic Toyah Culture Area. In South Texas, Hall et al. (1986) found bone-tempered plain wares with bison bone, Perdiz, Scallorn, and Edwards points, and an unknown stemmed point at site 41MC222, but no end scrapers or beveled knives. This is similar to what Hester and Hill (1975) and Montgomery (1978) reported at the Mariposa (41ZV83) and Tortuga Flat (41ZV155) sites farther west on the Rio Grande Plain. Moreover, as Inman et al. (1998: 28) note, “the apparent contemporaneity of Scallorn and Perdiz points from Tortuga Flat is in contrast to Central Texas where Scallorn points appear earlier in the Late prehistoric than do Perdiz points.” They also report several instances in which arrow points from both the Late Prehistoric I and II periods co- occur in South Texas sites 211

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(1998: 28–30). In such cases, archaeologists generally tend to question the archaeological and geological context of such sites, interpreting the apparently coeval occurrence of point types as a result of mixed and/or compressed stratigraphy. Although archaeologists’ concerns regarding mixed assemblages in South Texas sites are often justified, poor stratigraphy is a rather easy mark and may result in an a priori dismissal of the archaeological record. In areas along the western margins of the Coastal Plain, the distinctive asphaltum-covered sandy paste ceramics of the Rockport Phase are known to occur with bone-tempered plain wares at inland sites such as 41JW8, 41LK201, and 41RF21 (Black 1986, Johnson 1994, Ricklis 1996). Sites in far West Texas in the La Junta District and north and west of the Colorado River on the northwestern Edwards Plateau (41PS800, 41ST87) also frequently evidence non-local wares (e.g., Chupadero Black-on-white, polychrome, and/or monochrome Puebloan wares) (Cloud 2004, Cloud et al. 1994, Kelley 1986, Riemenschneider 1996). Of course, Perdiz points are common throughout much of Texas. However, several sites in Johnson’s (1994) Shared Toyah Culture Area and along the boundaries or margins of the Classic Toyah Culture Area exhibit considerable mixing of Perdiz and other Late Prehistoric arrow points, as well as various examples of different ceramic assemblages. For example, sites (41PC56, 41PC57, 41PC58, 41CX19) along the Pecos River contained numerous varieties of Chupadero, Jornada, and Caddo wares. Arrow points from these sites included Perdiz, Fresno, Toyah, and Harrell points (Rogers 1972). Sites (41TE53, 41TE54) located farther south and slightly west along the canyons of the Rio Grande evidenced no ceramics, but Perdiz, Cliffton, Toyah, Fresno, and Harrell points were documented together (Bandy 1980). In central North Texas, the Harrell site typifies the Henrietta Focus defined by Krieger (1946). Although Henrietta Focus sites often contain a Toyah lithic assemblage, this focus is generally characterized by the triangular side and base-notched Harrell point and a mussel shell-tempered ware referred to as “Nocona Plain” (Hughes 1942, Krieger 1946). However, Perdiz, Cliffton, Toyah, Fresno, and Washita points were all documented at this site, with some points (Washita, Perdiz, Fresno) occurring in equal or greater frequency than Harrell points (Fox 1939). Approximately fifty miles south of the Harrell Site, two other sites (41CJ2 and 41CJ23) also contained several different arrow point types, but no ceramics (Prewitt 1964). These sites, located in sandy soils just above the junction of the Sabana and Leon Rivers, contained what appear to be Perdiz, Cliffton, Harrell, Washita, Fresno, and Young points; one Garza point; and several unidentified stemmed points (Prewitt 1964: 154, 169, 171). 212

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Cyrus Ray (1935: 75) stated that pottery and the lithics with which they occurred in the Abilene area were observed most often on the surface or in plowed fields “in soils most suitable for raising crops.” Unfortunately, the documentation for most of these sites was lost, and little or no analysis has been conducted on the lithics and ceramics since the 1930s. Nevertheless, published data (Ray 1935) from four of these sites indicate that they contained all or most of the Toyah lithic assemblage. Ceramic forms included a wide variety of wares containing various tempers (mussel shell, grog, bone, and limestone) and even Rio Grande Glaze ware (from New Mexico), which was confirmed by H. P. Mera (Griffin 1935, Ray 1935: 84). Ray (1935: 71–73) went on to say that “the type of arrow head which occurs most frequently” in pottery sites was the Perdiz point. But he also documented three other arrow point types (e.g., Fresno, Washita, and Harrell) that occurred in almost equal numbers with Perdiz points and ceramics. These data generally support Johnson’s model of a Toyah Shared Area, indicating that other point types and ceramic wares often overshadow Toyah assemblages. In addition, archaeologists (Aten 1983, Boyd 1997, Collins 1971, Drass 1997, Hester 1995, Jelks 1962, Kelley 1947, Krieger 1946, Lehmer 1948, Mallouf 1990, Miller 2001, Perttula 1992, Perttula et al. 1995, Ricklis 1996, Suhm 1960, Turpin 1995) previously distinguished several Late Prehistoric material cultures corresponding to early historic cultural groups. Some of these groups possessed elements of the Toyah material culture (i.e., Rockport Phase/Karankawa, Frankston Focus/Hasinai, La Junta/Abriaches, and dozens of Puebloan groups), and many were located at some distance from the Classic Toyah Area. Toyah artifacts are also distinctly absent in some areas, such as the Panhandle (Boyd 1997) and far South Texas (Hester 1995) in the Brownsville-Barril Complex Area. Thus, when viewed from a regional perspective, there are significant gaps between Toyah and some groups. However, even a cursory examination of sites along the periphery of the Classic Toyah Area indicates far greater cultural diversity and less uniformity in Toyah material culture than was previously proposed. Some sites reflect a wide variety of artifacts, exhibiting different types and decorative styles of arrow points and ceramics (e.g., Pecos River and Comanche County sites [41PC56, 41PC57, 41PC58, 41CX19, 41CJ2, 41CJ23]). These sites may have been located along boundaries between marriage groups, indicative of places where various cultural identities met and interacted along the margins of their homelands. These sites are distinguished from residential sites in a marriage group by the multiple cultural identities, also indicative of the social interaction that occurred among groups. However, other areas in the region—particularly between the Colorado 213

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River and Brazos River around Abilene and farther east on the Blackland Prairie and Lampasas Cut Plain/Fort Hood—evidence similar artifacts and assemblages distributed across narrowly defined geographic areas of only a few thousand square kilometers respectively. For example, the group of sites near Abilene (41NL19, 41NL17, 41TA40, and 41TA87) possesses a distinct ceramic assemblage, but also reflects overlap with surrounding areas, evidenced by arrow points from adjacent areas to the north, south, east, and west. Sites on the Blackland Prairie and Lampasas Cut Plain on and near Fort Hood (41BL23, 41CV41, 41CV48, 41CV344, 41HI105, 41ML46, 41WM71) suggest that the former occupants shared a lithic assemblage with their southern and western neighbors and a ceramic assemblage with their neighbors to the east. However, current research also suggests that at least some of the Caddo-like ceramics recovered from this area may have been locally manufactured. Also, as more data accumulates, it is becoming increasingly untenable simply to label everything adjacent to the Caddo Culture Area as some aspect of Caddo and/or to label everything adjacent to the Toyah Culture Area as Toyah. This is not to say that these sociocultural identities, as well as their influence and direction of influence, did not change through time; they almost certainly did. But the geographically restricted sources of raw materials, daily practice, and patterned similarity observed among sites in specific areas may suggest a closer affinity and/or more frequent interaction among local peoples. This situation presents a good opportunity for observing and describing marriage groups and, thus, various cultural identities in the prehistoric record. Similarly, a defining element of marriage groups is shared language. Unfortunately, in many areas of Texas, linguistic data are unavailable and will likely remain so (although a Jumano dictionary is rumored to exist). Nonetheless, Johnson and Campbell (1992) document the existence of several languages (Aranama, Coahuiltecan, Comecrudan, Cotonamean, Karankawan, Quinigua-Borrado, Pamaque-Borrado, Sanan, and Solano) spoken in South Texas, the Coastal Plain, and areas just east and southeast of the Edwards Plateau during the early Historic Period. Although Johnson and Campbell (1992) stress the scarcity of extant linguistic data for these groups, they present some data concerning the location, practices, and interaction of one linguistic group in particular, the Sanan, divided into eastern and western (located primarily in northeastern Coahuila) Sanan speakers. Their research was primarily concerned with the Eastern Sanan located east and southeast of the Edwards Plateau, consisting of at least five bands, the Caguas, Emate, Sana, Sijame, and Toho, and perhaps several more, including the Aujuiap, Cocomeioje, Macocoma, Menanquen, 214

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Mesquite, Paguanan, Tacam, Tenu, and Zorquan ( Johnson and Campbell 1992: 186). According to early explorers and missionaries, the Sana occupied the prairie and monte (brush country) along and between the Colorado and Guadalupe Rivers and ranged as far north and east as the San Gabriel and Brazos Rivers ( Johnson and Campbell 1992: 207–208). They were described as living in small communities or rancherías, often entertaining visitors from different areas (e.g., Jumano and Hasinai [Caddo]), particularly when bison were present (Foster 1995: 89, 219). According to Johnson and Campbell (1992: 206), records from the San Antonio de Valero mission “demonstrate forcefully that Sanan speakers almost always married individuals of their own named group or people of another Sanan-speaking entity, at least before missionization,” adding that “the spouses of most people were from another Sanan band rather than their own.” Thus, these Sanan-speaking people appear to represent precisely the type of endogamous hunter-gatherer marriage groups described above. Johnson and Campbell are quick to note that it is impossible to know for certain the state of pre- contact marriage patterns. They acknowledge that aboriginal population loss and displacement, due to European contact and Native American (such as the Athapaskans) incursions, exerted significant pressure in terms of merging groups and changing community size. However, they also point out that flexibility in post-nuptial residence patterns for both males and females is not uncommon among “small hunter-gatherer communities, particularly where a scattered ethnic cluster like the Sanan included some very small named entities” ( Johnson and Campbell 1992: 206). Nevertheless, this work presents compelling linguistic data that at least some hunter-gatherers in the region were organized into endogamous marriage/linguistic groups. Based on early Spanish accounts, Johnson (1994: 279) also plotted the approximate ranges of three of the language groups (Aranama, Coahuiltecan, and Eastern Sanan). Although Coahuiltecan appears to encompass a large area, this may reflect the dispersed subsistence patterns in this part of Texas and/or the wider role of Coahuiltecan as a lingua franca in South Texas ( Johnson and Campbell 1992: 204). Alternatively, the spatial extent of Aranama and Sanan speakers is narrower, perhaps reflecting a richer environmental setting within a more circumscribed area and/or a tighter-knit, more cohesive culture group. At least one historic group, the Pacuache, were known to be native Coahuiltecan speakers and several historical accounts place the Pacuache in western South Texas for almost seventy-five years (Campbell 1979, 1988; Inman et al. 1998). Archaeological investigations, combined with ethnohistorical and linguistic data, indicate that Tortuga Flat (41ZV155) “was within 215

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the territorial range of the cultural group named the Pacuache, and it is likely that they and other small bands occupied the site on a seasonal basis” (Inman et al. 1998: 13). In fact, many sites (41ZV10, 41ZV83, and several of the Chaparossa Ranch sites) in this area share similar artifacts, assemblages, and features with 41ZV155 (Inman et al. 1998; Hester 1975, 1978, 1995; Hester and Hill 1975; Montgomery 1978). Although the Pacuache were almost certainly not the only indigenous Coahuiltecan-speaking band, 41ZV155 appears to represent a residential base within a band or community that, combined with other sites and communities, composed a distinct marriage group. The Pacuache example also underscores the necessity and utility of employing multiple lines of evidence to differentiate cultural identity in a specific time and place. Although the amount of evidence needed may often be diverse and ponderous, these examples suggest it is at least possible to reconstruct the spatial and temporal distribution of prehistoric marriage groups. Furthermore, the archaeological data presented above indicates several different clusters of sites, each possessing a distinct material culture, along the periphery of the Classic Toyah Area possessing non–Toyah ceramic assemblages and/or projectile points (Figure 8.5). This suggests closer interaction among sites within these areas than with sites outside of their respective areas. Although some aspects of Toyah assemblages are present, they occur less frequently than in other areas, suggesting that the people who lived in these clusters of sites had limited external interaction with groups outside the area and/or more intense internal interaction among bands within their respective areas. Thus, by comparing and contrasting archaeological data from multiple sites in the region, it is possible to define distinct geographic areas composed of sites representing several related bands or communities during the Late Prehistoric II Period. These areas, as well as the community ranges within them, can also be compared to similar historical and ethnographic examples of communities and marriage groups in similar environmental settings to determine if they are consistent with the historical and ethnographic data. Combining the mapped distribution of early historic linguistic groups with hypothetical prehistoric marriage groups described above reveals at least two significant pieces of spatial information. First, despite independent derivative data and methods, the extent (size) of Johnson’s three linguistic groups and that of the three prehistoric marriage groups is very similar. Second, the sizes of all these groups are consistent with ethnographic and environmental contextual data for hunter-gatherer marriage groups in similar environmental settings. When combined with previously defined prehistoric and early historic cul216

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fIgUre 8.5 Locations of historic linguistic groups and hypothetical prehistoric marriage groups (after Johnson 1994: Figure 106 and Johnson and Campbell 1992: Figure 1).

tures in the region, the spatial gaps separating the Classic Toyah from other historically known cultures begins to diminish (Figure 8.6). In short, multiple lines of evidence applied at multiple scales of analysis permit finer resolution in terms of reconstructing interaction and identity. This finer resolution can fill some of the gaps in our understanding of this region and undoubtedly points to greater cultural diversity than is visible in the archaeological record alone. This presents a compelling argument for the fundamentally interactive and, by extension, transformative character of hunter-gatherer social interaction consistent with ethnographic data. For example, although it is possible 217

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fIgUre 8.6 Historic and Late Prehistoric indigenous cultures combined with Johnson’s linguistic groups and hypothetical reconstructions of marriage groups (Arnn 2007).

to distinguish specific identities in the form of marriage groups, virtually all of these groups also evidence some connection with external social networks. Some of these areas, such as that encompassed by the Abilene group, apparently experienced significant culture change over relatively short periods of time, resulting in some confusion among archaeologists’ perception of these cultures. For example, Ray (1935) and Sayles (1935) defined the Brazos Culture as extending from approximately the Late Archaic into the Late Prehistoric I Period. Creel (1990) defines the Blow Out Mountain Phase for the same area as overlapping with the latter portion of the Brazos Culture (approximately A.D. 800–900) and extending into the Toyah Interval (ca. A.D. 1300). As indicated above, Henrietta as well as Garza peoples also were found in this area and by A.D. 1700 historic records document that the Apache were present. However, by approximately A.D. 1650, fewer than 150 years after initial European contact, there was an almost total secession of indigenous 218

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material deposition ( Johnson 1994). Thus, in the span of a thousand years (A.D. 700 to A.D. 1700), as many as six different Native American cultural identities, perhaps more, may have inhabited this one area. In general, the latter portion of the Late Prehistoric Period represents significant sociocultural complexity, and although recognizing difference and marking similarity in the archaeological record is a fundamental step in understanding this era, thick archaeological description is often not enough. However, a rich context can often provide finer resolution to the archaeological data and result in significant insights capable, in this case, of distinguishing prehistoric marriage/linguistic/culture groups.

dIstIngUIshIng a “CLassIC toyah marrIage/ LIngUIstIC groUP” An endogamous culture group consists of bands/communities linked together through frequent and intense social interaction based on kinship, language, and shared cultural practices. Thus, in very broad terms, the archaeological correlates for an endogamous hunter-gatherer linguistic group can be defined as a group of residential bases distributed across a large (several thousand square kilometers) contiguous area possessing an almost identical material culture. Perhaps nowhere is the material culture of sites more similar than among Toyah sites (41ED28, 41KM16, 41KM69, 41KM226, 41MN33, 41MN55, and 41TG91) representing the residential base camps of hunter-gatherers who once inhabited the western Edwards Plateau (Figure 8.7). Since the 1980s, several Late Prehistoric II residential components have been intensively excavated and reported, including the Classic Toyah type-site, the Buckhollow Site (41KM16), generally accepted as one of the best examples of a Toyah residential base camp (Creel 1990, Johnson 1994). Collectively, the artifacts, assemblages, and features recovered from these sites reflect a remarkably consistent material culture and, by extension, subsistence and settlement practices across an area of approximately 10,000 square kilometers. Although some detailed analyses at some sites (41KM69, 41KM226) are not complete, available data do provide some baseline for comparisons. Within these seven residential base camps, Classic Toyah material culture is clearly evident. The entire lithic assemblage is present in all sites and, although few whole vessels have been recovered, the ceramic assemblage appears to consist almost entirely of small undecorated bone-tempered bowls, often with buff and/or tan burnished exteriors (Arnn 2007, Creel 1990, 219

fIgUre 8.7 Location of residential base camps on the western Edwards Plateau evidencing similar material culture (Arnn 2007).

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Johnson 1994). Burned rock hearths and concentrations of mussel shell are the most ubiquitous features and deer the most common fauna in site assemblages, although bison is often present. These sites are also almost invariably located in similar settings on large river terraces possessing abundant native pecan trees. Exotic artifacts are present at sites in this area, but they do not occur in great abundance. A single fragment of a marine shell pendant was recovered at 41KM226 and two ceramic sherds from 41KM16 were assigned an exotic, or “alien,” context based on characteristics of paste and temper ( Johnson 1994: 203). In addition, two pieces of marine shell were recovered at the Varga Site (41ED28) and together with the fragment from 41KM226 these exotics indicate some interaction, albeit limited, with people to the south. But for the most part exotic artifacts are rare among Toyah Interval sites in this area and, when present, are generally represented by a small number of non–Perdiz projectile points. For example, the Buckhollow Site (41KM16) contained seventy Perdiz arrow points and only eight exotic arrow points, including Fresno, Harrell, and, perhaps, a Toyah point and others that may represent Late Prehistoric I points ( Johnson 1994: 87–88). Omitting early arrow points brings the number of exotics to roughly four, resulting in a figure of approximately 6 percent exotic arrow points recovered at Buckhollow. Excavations at the Janee Site (41MN33), representing less than 10 percent of the volume excavated at Buckhollow, recovered seven Perdiz points, a Padre point, a Fresno point, and a possible Alba point. Other sites in this area (41ED28, 41KM69 and 41KM226) also reflect small percentages of non–Perdiz arrow points representing between 5 and 15 percent of total points recovered from each site. One exception to the low percentage of exotic arrow points recovered from sites in this group or cluster occurs in the northernmost site, 41TG91, located just south of the confluence of the North, Middle, and South Concho Rivers. Here exotic arrow points (e.g., Harrell, Fresno, Garza, and several untyped points perhaps attributable to the Blow Out Mountain Phase) represent approximately 46 percent of the total number of arrow points recovered from 41TG91 (Creel 1990: 90–100). These exotic points are primarily distributed north of this area, thus, their occurrence at 41TG91 may reflect cultural antecedents or interaction with areas to the north. These points may also be indicative of a site situated on the edge of a social boundary. When artifact and feature data from sites spanning both areas are compared, the evidence for cultural boundaries is difficult to ignore. For example, sites 41RN169, 41TG346, 41CC131, and 41CN95, north and east of 41TG91 221

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fIgUre 8.8 Various Late Prehistoric II sites located on or adjacent to the Edwards Plateau. Note the different geographic areas and the north/south division of hearth types along the Concho and Colorado Rivers.

(Figure 8.8), evidence significant differences in both the numbers of exotic points, as well as feature types from sites in the 41TG91 (western Edwards Plateau) group. Along the confluence of the Concho and Colorado Rivers, approximately 60 kilometers east of 41TG91, sites 41CC131 and 41CN95 evidence 20 percent or more of exotic arrow points. Moreover, sites 41RN169, 41CC131, 41CN95, and 41TG346 also reflect a high number of unlined hearths and, to a lesser extent, exotic ceramics when compared to the Classic Toyah sites (41ED28, 41KM16, 41KM69, 41KM226, 41MN33, and 41MN55) located farther south. Taken together, these data suggest different culture areas and may delineate boundary zones. Similar patterns, in terms of exotic ceramics, have also been observed in other portions of the state. For example, 41HM51 in the Blackland Prairie/ Lampasas Cut Plain Group and sites (41TV441 and 41HY209) located in 222

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or near the ecotonal zone between the Edwards Plateau and the Blackland Prairie, 41FY135 on the Coastal Plain, as well as sites in South Texas (41JW8) all evidence exotic ceramic groups. These sites also appear to represent specific culture areas and/or boundary zones. With respect to hearth features, sites 41RN169, 41CC131, and 41CN95, located along the northern periphery of the Classic Toyah region, exhibit a higher frequency of hearths containing little or no burned rock, sometimes referred to as unlined hearths (see Figure 8.8). Unlined hearths are a relatively common feature in many Plains sites, where rock does not occur with anywhere near the frequency of the Edwards Plateau. However, the lower frequency of rock in hearths at sites north of the Concho and Colorado Rivers cannot be attributed to the paucity of rock in this area. This suggests that the construction, use, and function of unlined hearths and associated practices are not necessarily dictated by the absence of rock at these specific locations. Instead, unlined hearths were likely constructed for a different purpose than rock-lined hearths found in the Classic Toyah region and/or by people who did not typically construct rock cooking features. For example, unlined hearths may reflect stone boiling or be indicative of a function entirely unrelated to food processing, such as signal fires. Thus, the frequent presence of specific features in one area and their absence in another may be viewed as indicative of different cultural practices, perhaps different culinary traditions, among different cultural identities. However, along the Concho River, we see both types of features on both sides of the river with dominant numbers of each type on their respective banks. Sites 41MK8 and 41MK9 are included on the map because excavations documented several burned rock features spanning the Middle Archaic into the Late Prehistoric II periods at those sites (Black 1997). In terms of distribution, virtually all sites documented north of the Concho River contain at least some, if not several, unlined hearths, a situation that is reversed when one goes south of the Concho, where unlined hearths are only occasionally present at some sites. Furthermore, the use of rock ovens and rock-lined hearths to bake various foods has been well documented on the Edwards Plateau, representing a continuous culinary tradition dating back several millennia (Black and Creel 1997: 301). However, areas of the Great Plains farther north are treeless and topsoil may be more than 50 meters deep. In such areas, people learned not to rely on rock and wood. Plains traditions required instead only a shallow depression to shelter the fire from the wind and bison dung for fuel. In contrast, rock is plentiful on the Edwards Plateau, as is hardwood capable of pro223

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ducing coals to heat rocks to high enough temperatures to bake geophytes for hours. This presents an ideal environment for the development of hot rock technology. The point emphasized here is that people living on the Edwards Plateau chose to practice a specific type of cooking, using rock as a heating element that resulted in distinct burned rock features (rock-lined hearths and/ or burned rock middens), and others located on the Plains farther north did not. As Black and Creel state, “individual midden sites are themselves part of much wider spatial (settlement) patterns that reflect the cultural geographies of past societies” (1997: 284). Thus, if Plains folk made one or more migrations, they apparently did not bring the culinary tradition of unlined hearths with them onto the Edwards Plateau. Nor do their arrow point types occur in abundance on the Plateau. Instead, the co- occurrence of exotic point types and hearth features with Classic Toyah material culture suggests several distinct social groups aggregating and interacting along a more or less permeable social boundary defined by the Concho and Colorado Rivers. As Steve Black, one of the leading authorities on burned rock features, notes, “the Colorado River may have served as a cultural boundary or buffer zone at some times and as a travel route at others” (1997: 169). To this we may also add the Concho River. Faunal assemblages from various Toyah sites also suggest some variation from one area to another in terms of animals extracted from the local environments. Not surprisingly, sites (41RN169, 41TG91, 41TG346, 41KM16, 41CC131, 41CN95) located in areas that, according to historical accounts, contained abundant bison herds tend to reflect higher numbers of bison in their faunal assemblages than sites located in the Classic Toyah region. Although much has been made of the “presence” or “absence” of bison in the region, many archaeologists are uncomfortable with the polarity of these terms, preferring instead “scarcity” and “abundance.” In fact, bison did not blanket the entire region in large numbers and, archaeologically, most large herds appear to have been limited to specific areas—such as the northern Edwards Plateau, Blackland Prairie, and adjacent areas containing bison-friendly habitats. Nevertheless, models for this period imply that local peoples discarded practices that served them well for thousands of years and became nomadic bison hunters. It seems more likely that most Toyah peoples hunted bison opportunistically, rather than engaging in large-scale communal bison hunts similar to those practiced by Plains peoples to the north. This point is perhaps best illustrated when we consider the faunal assem224

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blage from sites such as 41HY209, where two bison appear among twenty-five deer. Viewed in a regional context, bison bone in sites closer to bison habitat may simply reflect opportunistic hunting indicative of subsistence practices among broad-spectrum foragers. Therefore, the case for Toyah peoples as “bison hunters” is not as straightforward as it may first appear. There is also some speculation—and perhaps even evidence, albeit as yet unpublished—that bison were not as scarce in most parts of Texas prior to the Toyah Interval as previously thought. If subsequent investigations of pre– Toyah and post–Late Archaic sites do turn up evidence for significant numbers of bison, there will definitely be some explaining to do, and it will not be focused on environmental factors pertaining to subsistence, technology, and chronology, but rather on the nature of archaeological inference with respect to technology and practice. Although bison and, to a lesser extent, antelope are common in sites on or adjacent to prairie environments, many Toyah faunal assemblages also show a wide variety of other game (Black 1986, Johnson 1994, Highley 1986, Creel 1990, Hester 1995, Treece et al. 1993). Mussel shell and related features are common in Classic Toyah components, but their frequency drops off significantly in many sites with mixed assemblages (41RN169, 41TG346, 41CC131, 41CN95) along the Concho River. The term “concho” is Spanish for “shell,” so we may infer that there was no shortage of mussels in the environment. In addition, many historic Plains groups were said to prohibit the consumption of shellfish. Again, this suggests the absence of mussel shells in these sites was not dictated by environmental determinants but rather by practice. Although some sites discussed here cannot be considered representative of residential base camps, most are generally accepted as being intensively excavated and therefore may provide some baseline data concerning the degree to which exotic artifacts and practices permeated various social boundaries. Sites with relatively thick (20–50 cm) Toyah components containing both burned rock and mussel shell features, the entire Toyah material assemblage, and few non–Toyah (exotic) artifacts (e.g., Caddoan or Puebloan ceramics, non–Perdiz arrow points) suggest repeatedly occupied Toyah residential base camps. However, some sites—for example, Mustang Branch (41HY209-T) and Rush Site (41TG346), known primarily as butchering or processing sites—can be used to demonstrate contrasts in the frequency of artifacts, features, and deposition between residential base camps and more specialized sites (e.g., procurement and/or processing sites). It is also important to remember that each site is only part of the larger community, composed of many site types, perhaps even several residential 225

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sites within the community territory. Therefore, it is likely that most, if not all, sites represent distinct bands/communities which, in turn, formed part of a marriage group. Given the broad distribution of some of these sites, it is likely that more than one marriage group is represented. This is very similar to what Lightfoot et al. (1998) described as a pluralistic cultural setting composed of hundreds of different cultural identities, each occupying their own specific ranges but also interacting with neighboring as well as distant groups, constantly dissolving, forming, and reforming new identities. Despite permeable boundaries and the transformative character of culture, it is possible to observe persistent practice and technology and, by extension, identity. In general, sites, particularly residential bases, evidence increasingly pronounced variation (particularly in terms of source materials and stylistic decoration) in artifacts, assemblages, and features as distance from the geographic center of the marriage/linguistic group area increases. This is precisely the situation presented when the Toyah residential sites on the western Edwards Plateau are compared with sites located along the Concho River. Although these sites share some elements, the picture that emerges is consistent with social interaction across a boundary between two or more culture areas and/or two or more marriage groups. The fact that almost 50 percent of the arrow points recovered at 41TG91 generally occur more frequently in areas to the north and east of the site clearly indicates interaction with groups in those areas. Nevertheless, the practice indicative of the features and the basic composition of material culture (artifacts, assemblages, and features) appear to be fundamentally oriented with sites farther south on the western Edwards Plateau. Thus, 41TG91 may represent the northernmost residential base and/or boundary site of a marriage/linguistic group or specific cultural identity. However, the presence of a similarly defined southern boundary for this hypothetical culture group is less obvious. Nonetheless, it is possible to see to whom their relationships were linked and in what direction their networks were oriented. For example, the marine shell recovered from 41KM226 suggests some interaction or relationship with areas much farther south. The recovery of more marine shell, including a bead, at the Varga Site (41ED28), 40 kilometers south of 41KM226, also supports this inference. In fact, the species of marine shell, Oliva sayana, recovered at 41KM226 is typical of the shell industry for that period located near the mouth of the Rio Grande River. Thus, the southernmost sites within this group on the western Edwards Plateau reflect some level of participation in long-distance networks to the south. In general, this particular group of Toyah sites reflects permeable northern 226

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and southern boundaries, and both long-distance (South Texas) and shortdistance (Plains) networks link them to other distinct groups. However, it is only through the comparison of analogous data from various sites that it is possible to gain a baseline understanding of the region and distinguish clusters of similar sites in specific areas—which are indicative of distinct culture groups or identities. This type of baseline data is also crucial to understanding the ramifications of exotic materials (e.g., interaction) in these sites. Ethnographic data from hunter-gatherer groups living in similar environments can also be combined with archaeological data to further refine the concept of prehistoric culture groups. For example, theoretical and ethnographic evidence (Hardesty 1977, Hitchcock and Bartram 1998, Kelly 1995, Lee 1979, Lightfoot 1983, Lourandos 1997, Taylor 1964, Yellen 1977) indicates small mobile groups of hunter-gatherers often occupied certain areas on the basis of specific resources in that particular environment. Therefore, it is reasonable to infer that it may be possible to observe distinct environmental parameters within the area of a specific culture group. In fact, the distribution of residential sites in the western Edwards Plateau group closely matches a distinct environmental setting defined by specific annual rainfall, mean annual temperature (Figure 8.9), and, to a lesser extent, soils. These sites also appear to be ideally situated to take advantage of both riparian and upland resources, a settlement pattern indicative of broadspectrum foraging and reflected in Toyah lithic technology. Moreover, these sites evidence a specific suite of daily practices reflecting local and experiential adaptations, as well as situationally specific social interaction within distinct environmental settings (Lightfoot et al. 1998: 202). It is only when the patterning of material culture from a group of sites (such as the western Edwards Plateau group) is contrasted against the environmental and archaeological diversity found in other residential bases in other areas of the region that distinct cultural identities emerge. But residential bases in Texas are seldom explicitly addressed in terms of the communities they represent. Instead, they are generally identified, excavated, and reported as isolated sites with little or no synthesis with other sites in the area, much less the region. Therefore, fundamental information, such as the size of community/band territories and how such areas compare with historical accounts and/or ethnographic data, remains unknown. How then can environmental, ethnographic, historical, and archaeological contexts for a specific area be integrated to reconstruct a specific marriage/ linguistic culture group on the western Edwards Plateau, in what Johnson referred to as the “Classic Toyah Culture Area”? Environmental data indicate that this area ranges from semi-arid Rolling Plains and mesquite savanna, 227

fIgUre 8.9 Approximate location of tested Toyah Interval residential sites in relation to annual precipitation (top) and mean annual temperature (bottom).

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dominated by Mesquite-Juniper-Live Oak brush, in the west, to sub-humid Live Oak-Mesquite-Ashe Juniper parks in the east, and from the Rolling Plains in the north to the Balcones Canyonlands in the south (Griffith et al. 2004, TPWD 1984). In fact, the climate in the western portion of the Classic Toyah is also not dissimilar to that found in the central and northern Kalahari of southern Africa and inhabited by various hunter-gatherer cultural groups (Hitchcock and Bartram 1998, Kelly 1995, Lee 2003, Silberbauer 1981, Wiessner 1983, Yellen 1977). Although the Edwards Plateau has a slightly lower mean average temperature, approximately 10 centimeters more annual rainfall, and more frost days than the Kalahari, both environments are somewhat similar in terms of extreme seasonal variations in temperature, annual precipitation, and the distribution of flora, fauna, and water resources (Blair 1950, Bomar 1983, Silberbauer 1981). As discussed in Chapter 2, Hitchcock and Bartram (1998: 24) list several hunter-gatherer groups living in the Kalahari during the late twentieth century and provide range size, population size, and population density for their respective territories. Their (Hitchcock and Bartram 1998) work indicates that most groups in the Northwest and Central Kalahari are composed of approximately one hundred people occupying ranges of approximately 1,600 square kilometers. This figure is an average, with some groups occupying territories as small as 300–600 square kilometers and others more than 4,000 square kilometers. Nevertheless, most fell within approximately 1,000 to 2,000 square kilometer range. Spanish court records presented in Chapter 5 document that in 1683, twelve Jumano captains of rancherías accompanied their leader, Juan Sabeata, to El Paso del Norte (Wade 2003: 236). It is likely that the term “ranchería” referred to a community. Thus, by extension there were at least twelve bands, or communities, of Jumano at this time. Although the precise location of these rancherías is unclear, the Jumano homeland, for more than fifty years prior to this encounter, was known to be along the “River of Nuts” and/or “River of Shells” (the Concho River) east of the Pecos River. Apache/Jumano enmity, rooted in Apache incursions from the north, was recorded almost one hundred years prior to Sabeata’s declaration, so it is certainly reasonable to infer that by 1683, the Jumano homeland was located to the south of the Concho River, rather than to the north. In addition, archaeological evidence from the very late Prehistoric Period immediately preceding the Historic Period also suggests a distinct cultural boundary along the Concho and Colorado Rivers. By all accounts, the Jumano homeland was rich in deer, turkey, bison, 229

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mussels, and pecans, and, with the exception of bison, this remains true of the area today. The Mendoza-Lopez diaries also state that no bison were seen until after the expedition crossed the Pecos, which is consistent with the observation that bison bone is generally absent in Late Prehistoric sites west of the Pecos. The diaries also indicate that the expedition’s return followed a slightly different route, farther south to avoid the Apache, and that a Jumano interpreter was appointed. The fact that a Jumano interpreter was appointed on the return journey strongly suggests that Jumano was also spoken by a significant number of communities south of the Concho River. Archaeologically, several sites (41PC56, 41PC57, 41PC58, 41CX3, 41CX4, 41CX19, 41CX20, 41CX23) located in the vicinity of the modern towns of Iraan and Girvin are likely candidates for the area where the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition crossed the Pecos River. However, the expedition diaries state that just west of the Pecos River, the party was welcomed by the Gediondo, allies of the Jumano, who invited the expedition to stay with them (Wade 2003: 98). The expedition diaries also note that the Gediondo encampment was located on the east side of the Pecos River “at the foot of a great rock (peñol ) that sheltered them from their enemies, the Apache” (Wade 2003: 99). In fact, there is an isolated butte located on the Pecos River in the vicinity of Iraan that rises approximately 60 meters above the surrounding terrain and atop its summit are three distinct stone circles, as well as some less distinct stone structures, that resemble nothing so much as Cielo Complex features (Collett 2002). Although no diagnostics were recovered among these structures, Perdiz points were recovered on the surface of a large site (41CX4) located at the base of this rise and stretching for several hundred meters along the east bank of the Pecos. The expedition chronicles also make it clear that most indigenous campsites were situated on rivers, streams, and springs, which is also consistent with the Toyah Interval sites of the western Edwards Plateau. These data suggest some boundaries for the Jumano homeland, as well as some idea of the size of community territories. Although it is uncertain if the Gediondo were part of the Jumano marriage group, it is clear that they were on friendly terms in A.D. 1684 and that Gediondo lands bordered those of the Jumano. Therefore, site 41CX4 (i.e., Gediondo encampment) and the distinctive landmark of the butte likely represented the westernmost limit of the Jumano homeland. Given the range of Apache incursions at this time, the Concho River was almost certainly the northernmost drainage in the Jumano territory. Jumano and Spanish conflict with the Cuitoa, Excanxaque, and Ayjado in A.D. 1650 occurred somewhere close to the confluence of the Concho and Colo230

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fIgUre 8.10 Hypothetical distribution of community territories in the Jumano marriage/linguistic group plotted in relation to Johnson’s (1994: Figure 105) Toyah Culture areas.

rado Rivers and, this suggests the eastern boundary of Jumano lands. The rest of their homeland extended to the south for an unknown distance. With these basic parameters in mind, the 1,600 square kilometers figure cited for hunter-gatherers in similar semi-arid environments can be combined with the number of Jumano captains (twelve) accompanying Sabeata in 1683 and the spatial ranges for fourteen forager communities oriented along large drainages on the western Edwards Plateau can be plotted. Figure 8.10 depicts these hypothetical community ranges in the western portion of this area with 1,600 square-kilometer territories. 231

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However, communities in the eastern portion of this area are plotted more conservatively (approximately 1,000–1,500 sq. km), reflecting greater annual precipitation and, by extension, denser resources in this eastern area. Some of these ranges are also centered over known Toyah residential bases and, when combined, the plotted hypothetical community ranges cover large portions of the western Edwards Plateau and what was once the historical Jumano homeland (Figure 8.10). Based on the territorial extent and population density of Kalahari forager bands presented by Hitchcock and Bartram (1998: 24–25), an extremely conservative population estimate for communities on the western Edwards Plateau would average between 80 to 110 persons per community. Multiplying the number of persons per community by the number of Jumano captains (twelve) given in the 1683, a population estimate for most of the western Edwards Plateau area falls between 960 to 1,320 persons. This figure is likely low, given the slightly greater rainfall and, thus, higher carrying capacity of the Edwards Plateau compared to the central and northern Kalahari. Although small and dispersed over a large area, this population size is certainly within the parameters for a marriage group (MacDonald and Hewlett 1999, Wobst 1974) and approximates the spatial boundaries for the linguistic groups proposed by Johnson (1994). Although rough, this population estimate provides a heuristic device for contextualizing forager communities on the landscape and makes it possible to generate testable hypotheses. For example, if residential sites in this area represent bands of a marriage/linguistic/culture group, similarities in material culture, as well as significant differences, should be clearly evident when compared to residential bases in other areas. Another hypothesis might focus on the degree to which exotic artifacts, assemblages, and features occur in various residential sites across the landscape in order to observe if more or less conservative residential sites are located near the center of a marriage group’s area. Although archaeological data from the western Edwards Plateau is limited, when combined with the spatial data presented in Figures 8.4, 8.5, 8.8, 8.9 and 8.10, they indicate that residential sites along the upper portion of major drainages in this area can be differentiated from other sites in the Shared Toyah Area and the Classic Toyah Area. Considered individually or as a group, Late Prehistoric II sites in this portion of the western Edwards Plateau display a much purer suite of Toyah material culture as described by Johnson (1994) than virtually any other area in Texas. Buckhollow is centered in this area and appears to be the most “classic” of all Toyah sites. However, testing at other nearby sites (41MN33, 41MN55, 232

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41KM69, 41KM226, 41ED28) also reflects remarkably similar material culture. Finally, all these sites appear to be large residential base camps located in similar environmental settings on large river terraces. Therefore, these sites, when compared with each other, as well as with sites in adjacent areas, represent a truly Classic Toyah Culture Area.

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One of the current arguments against the coherence of cultures and the possibility of doing any kind of systematic ethnography is that, like a certain famous philosophical river, cultures are always changing. Such is the flux that one can never step in the same culture twice. Yet unless identity and consistency were symbolically imposed on social practices, as also on rivers, and not only by anthropologists but by the people, there could be no intelligibility or even sanity, let alone a society. So to paraphrase John Barth, reality is a nice place to visit (philosophically), but no one ever lived there. marshaLL sahLIns, Waiting for foucault, Still

This book focuses on identity and interaction in Texas between approximately A.D. 1300 and 1700, with the underlying premise that human interaction is based on recognizing similarity and marking difference resulting in various identities. The construction and maintenance of identities produce shared meaning (at least temporarily) and provide a basis for behavioral expectations that facilitate communication and social interaction and permit individuals and groups to negotiate their various agendas and goals. Moreover, the degree to which individuals, communities, and cultures can adopt, change, or shed identities significantly affects their ability to influence behavioral expectations and negotiate the outcomes of various social, political, and economic situations ( Jones 1997; Wiessner 1983, 1984; Hodder 1982). But identity and interaction are constantly shifting through time and space. The intrinsically flexible, situational, and negotiable character of identity and interaction cannot be emphasized enough: “such is the flux that one can never step in the same culture twice” (Sahlins 2002: 7). Nevertheless, some combinations of identity and interaction coalesce long enough to form specific patterns or traditions. In fact, transformation and persistence go hand in hand in the development of human individuals and societies. Therefore,

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both aspects must be considered in reconstructions of the past, and at least some aspects of tradition and change may be visible by the frequency, form, and style of artifacts and features distributed across the landscape during specific periods of time (Bush 2004, Dietler and Herbich 1998, Goodby 1998, Hitchcock and Bartram 1998, MacEachern 1998, McBrinn 2005, Stark 1998, Wiessner 1983). Toyah presents an interesting test case for reconstructing sociocultural identity and interaction. It is spatially and temporally broad, spanning most of Texas and both the Late Prehistoric and early Historic Periods, and little emphasis has been placed on clarifying identities and patterns of interaction within it. If the ethnographic and historical data presented here are any indication, significant cultural diversity and social interaction were indeed present. Thus, reconstructions of this region during this time should reflect both the dynamic and persistent character of indigenous identity and interaction. With this in mind, the study region was conceptualized as a broad “social field” in which individuals and groups participated through various identities and to varying degrees in multi-dimensional webs or networks of social interaction that extended far beyond the local band or community and through time (Welsch and Terrell 1998: 53). As Alexander Lesser (in Mintz 1985: 76) stated, “there is no limit to the relationships of people in any group to other groups, particularly the relationships you find at the most simple level.” When cast against the backdrop of previous and subsequent periods, both generative and descendent Toyah practices and technologies also become more apparent. Viewed as a continuum, Toyah reflects numerous unique cultures (Figure 9.1), each a product of distinct but interrelated historical traditions, specific environmental conditions, and broader regional trends. This emphasis on continuity makes it possible to discern antecedent technologies and practices that were also documented well into the Historic Period, suggesting a greater time span and more local origins for the Toyah phenomenon in general. A direct historical approach provided documentary evidence for the continuation of the prehistoric Toyah social field into the early Historic Period in the form of the Tejas Alliance. Historical accounts document an alliance composed of more than fifty distinct groups. These marriage/language/culture groups consisted, at the smallest scale, of loose-knit forager communities (bands) in which individuals or families might be affiliated with all or part of a different community and the broader social aggregate (the marriage/linguistic/culture group) for one or more seasons over the course of a year. Despite its size and composite character, the Tejas Alliance showed little 235

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fIgUre 9.1 Hypothetical Toyah/Tejas social field encompassing and linking virtually all communities, marriage/linguistic groups, and various social aggregates from the Caddo Culture Area in the east to the Rio Grande Puebloan Culture Area in the west, as well as those found from the Panhandle Plains south to the Gulf Coast and into Northern Mexico (Arnn 2007).

or no indication of a formal organizational structure, suggesting a bottom-up rather than top- down approach to political alliance. Although significant structure (e.g., stratification) is common in many political organizations (e.g., chiefdoms), formal structure was apparently deemphasized in this social field. Deemphasized social structure is also consistent with ethnographic accounts of hunter-gatherer social, political, and economic organization. However, historical accounts of the Caddo repeating the names of members of the Tejas Alliance suggest a greater emphasis on formal organization and stratification among some groups in this alliance (e.g., agriculturalists). Nevertheless, the non-centralized political, economic, and social organizations documented for hunter-gatherers in the Tejas Alliance reflect significant complexity, as well 236

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as diversity, even at the community or band level. This too is consistent with ethnographic data from other regions around the world. But no matter how chaotic social-scapes may appear, they are, nevertheless, the result of patterned behavior and should not be ignored by archaeologists. This is the reason for this book. Human social interaction is chaotic and patterned, transformational and persistent, local and remote, historical as well as situational. For some, this kaleidoscopic human behavioral context is simply too much. Nonetheless, these are the very things that make us human, and if the intent of anthropology (i.e., archaeology) is to study humans then these issues must be addressed. The perceived chaos and internal logic of social interaction may be minimized to some extent by using a direct historical approach to provide insight into the types of situations, interactions, and identities that resulted in the distributions of material culture. Historical documents do provide significant insights into the ways in which individuals and specific groups used various identities in multiple dimensions to negotiate particular social, economic, and/or political situations. However, this often requires reviewing many seemingly unrelated documents, recorded at different times and places across a large region, in order to understand the character, intent, and objectives of individuals or groups.

the jUmano: a Case stUdy In InteraCtIon and IdentIty Nowhere is this complexity more apparent than with respect to the Jumano, one of the most widely reported, if poorly understood, forager groups of Central Texas during the seventeenth century. Spanish and French chroniclers, writing at different times and in different places, independently documented through non–Jumano informants that the Jumano lived on the western Edwards Plateau, were members of the Tejas Alliance, and frequently visited the Hasinai (a western Caddo group and province) area. Kelley (1955: 984) also cited historical documentation indicating that the Caddo visited the Jumano in their lands, and archaeological evidence places Classic Toyah artifacts in Hasinai funerary contexts in East Texas and Caddo ceramics as far west as the Trans-Pecos. Interestingly, there is no written record of the Jumano ever referring to themselves as members of the Tejas Alliance. Given the social interaction documented between the Caddo and Jumano, this omission of self-ascription in the Tejas Alliance is puzzling. Spanish documents also indicate several in237

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stances in which the Jumano offered to introduce and serve as ambassadors to “the Kingdom of the Tejas” on behalf of the Spanish. Also, several joint Spanish/Jumano attempts were made to visit the “Tejas,” all to no avail. More than fifty years would pass from the time the Spanish first heard of the Tejas to their first visit to the Tejas “Kingdom.” In fact, the Spanish eventually bypassed altogether the route to the Tejas that took them through Jumano lands and when this historic meeting finally occurred, the Jumano were conspicuously absent. Given the renowned Jumano reputation as consummate travelers, traders, and communicators, their absence from this meeting and their own glaring omission from membership in the Tejas Alliance is perplexing. Why for more than half a century did the Jumano never discuss their role in the Tejas Alliance with the Spanish? Although unclear, the Jumano may have intentionally postponed direct contact between the Spanish and the Caddo in order to achieve specific goals or objectives. Thus, it may be useful to consider how purposefully confusing their own identity and interaction may have served Jumano regional interests. During the early and mid-seventeenth century, Spanish commercial interest in hides and pearls from Jumano lands and Catholic interest in the “Miraculous Conversion of the Xumana Nation,” recorded by Alonso de Benavides in 1632, spurred Spanish-Jumano interaction in Central Texas. By their own admission (e.g., “Declaration of Juan Sabeata,” 1683), the Jumano enjoyed more than fifty years of exclusive trade and social interaction with the Spanish in Central Texas. If the Jumano had introduced the Spanish to the large and powerful Tejas kingdom, the Spanish may simply have bypassed the Jumano in order to deal directly with the more populous, sedentary, and socially stratified agricultural Caddo. Spanish imperial practice suggests they would have beaten a hasty path to the Caddo had they been able to find them on their own. Nor after years of interaction were the Jumano unaware of Spanish practices and capabilities. The Jumano had a long relationship with at least some of the New Mexico Pueblos prior to and, perhaps, even after the Pueblo Revolt in 1680. For example, Juan Sabeata stated that he was baptized in Parral, a Spanish town deep in Chihuahua, Mexico. Some Jumano were captured and put to labor as encomiendados in Coahuila, Mexico, between 1658 and 1674 for at least a generation (Wade 2003). Although pressed into the Spanish encomienda system in Mexico, these Jumano maintained some status and later campaigned and won their release and the release of other indigenous peoples. Thus, there is little question that the Jumano were intimately familiar with Spanish social, economic, and political practices. 238

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Unique among most Texas indigenous groups, the Jumano were able to interact independently with the Spanish for more than fifty years. Given their knowledge and experience with the Spanish, the Jumano likely did not identify themselves as members of the Tejas Alliance (and, thus, Tejas) because they did not wish to compromise or diminish this unique position. As friends of and ambassadorial candidates to the “Tejas,” the Jumano managed to hold Spanish interest for many years. Moreover, as long as the Spanish regularly visited their lands, the Jumano had little to fear from the Athapaskan migration south. However, this situation changed dramatically with the 1680 Pueblo Revolt, the establishment of French trading outposts along the lower Mississippi and its tributaries, and the founding of La Salle’s colony on the Texas coast in the 1680s. The Jumano were suddenly confronted with a number of variables in terms of interacting with multiple and competing cultural groups in almost every direction. It also appears that no single universal strategy would have been adequate for achieving Jumano-specific goals. Historical documents reflect a wide variety of tactics and combinations of tactics that the Jumano employed in order to influence the Spanish. These included the careful timing of visits, the promise of settlement in fertile and densely populated lands, and the use of old commercial ties and friendships between the Spanish and the Jumano. These are the negotiating skills that one would expect a hunter-gather group to employ and the Jumano were renowned throughout this region for precisely this type of brokered interaction. It also seems likely that this repertoire included the ability to present one aspect of their identity to some individuals or groups while simultaneously presenting a different aspect to others. With this in mind, Sabeata’s declaration in 1683, in which he offered to serve as a middleman between the Spanish and the “Tejas,” must be viewed with a critical eye and through the broader context of regional social interaction. The missionary Casañas’s account states that the Tejas Alliance had its origins in antiquity and thus the Jumano may have been part of the alliance for some time. Nevertheless, the Jumano had offered the Spanish an introduction to the “Tejas” for almost fifty years prior to Sabeata’s declaration in 1683. Alternatively, scarcely four years later, Jumano/Chuman informants in East Texas told La Salle’s party that they were enemies of the Spanish and would make war on them if properly outfitted by the French. This was approximately the same time that Juan Sabeata was serving as a sort of ambassador/courier for the Spanish, as well as a representative of the Jumano nation. These accounts demonstrate that the Jumano were quite capable of sophisticated political machinations with the great European powers of the day. 239

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They successfully portrayed and perpetuated two different identities (one pro–Spanish and the other pro–French) and maintained behavioral expectations among two different groups (French and Spanish) who, not coincidentally, were at war. Perhaps the one constant in both French and Spanish documentary records is Jumano self-interests (e.g., protection from the Apaches and the acquisition of firearms and horses). However, during the latter portion of the seventeenth century, key factors converged that would ultimately have a significant impact on social interaction throughout the region: the Athapaskan migration reached as far south as Central Texas, horses and firearms became widely available throughout the region, and the Caddo actively began to assist the French in their efforts to trade with Native Americans and colonize East Texas (Foster 1995, 1998; Kelley 1955; Wade 2003). In the midst of this, Jumano individuals and parties were traveling throughout much of this region (Figure 9.2) and were probably one of the most well-informed groups during this period (Kelley 1955). Although their central location on the western Edwards Plateau afforded the Jumano excellent potential in terms of social interaction, intelligence gathering, and communication, it also left them vulnerable to attack and encroachment on all sides. Pressed as they were on their northern flank by the Apache and hemmed in to the south and west by the Spanish and to the east by the French, the Jumano must have found it difficult in the latter part of the seventeenth century to determine whether the Apache, Spanish, or French would eventually prevail. It seems unlikely that the Jumano became allies with their age- old enemies, the Apache, but neither the Spanish survivors of the Pueblo Revolt huddled in El Paso nor La Salle’s doomed colony presented particularly promising partners. Furthermore, the French and Spanish were enemies and to side with either meant losing favor with the other. Given these alternatives, the Jumano perhaps decided the most practical solution was to simply keep everyone “in play.” In short, it seems likely that they tried to gain support from both the Spanish and the French against the Apache in order to hold out until a clear-cut winner emerged and negotiations could begin anew. This appears to be precisely the strategy adopted by the Jumano in the late seventeenth century. In 1683, upon learning that the Spanish still had a sizable, if beleaguered, contingency in El Paso, the Jumano approached the Spanish and offered them exactly what they so desperately needed. However, it is impossible to know what transpired in the lands that lay beyond the diminished Spanish imperial frontier in the three years following the Pueblo Revolt. For example, although some historical accounts indicate that the Jumano and Apache became allies some fifty years later, they may have found 240

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fIgUre 9.2 The travels of the Jumano under Juan Sabeata, A.D. 1683–1692. 1. La Junta. 2. El Paso. 3. Julime. 4. Parral. 5. Concho River. 6. Caddo villages. 7. Guadalupe River ranchería. 8. Fort Saint Louis. 9. Sierra rancherías (after Kelley 1955: Figure 1).

some common ground at this time. If so, the Jumano visit may have simply been a ruse to draw the Spanish out and gather intelligence. Nor do the Spanish appear to have been unwitting pawns. Juan Dominguez de Mendoza, a member of the 1654 Guadalajara Expedition, apparently suspected Jumano intentions. When the Tejas failed to appear, yet again, during the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition in 1683–1684, he became so frustrated that he turned the expedition around and left the Jumano lands (Wade 2003: 115–117). The Jumano repeatedly asked the Spanish to attack the Apache, and although the expedition was attacked, horses were stolen, and the raiders were pursued, the Spanish never actually saw the Apache. It also seems prudent to ask why, in the context of regional politics and social interaction, the Jumano suddenly become interested in reestablishing ties with the 241

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Spanish. Although Sabeata’s 1683 declaration makes it clear that the Spanish and Jumano were close for many years prior to the 1680 Pueblo Revolt, why had they waited three years to contact the Spanish? One thing that does seem certain is that, from a Jumano perspective, the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition was a win/win situation. If the Jumano were enemies of the Apache at this time, simply having the Spanish in their lands for a brief period may have afforded them some protection against the Apache advance southward. Alternatively, if allied with the Apache, they stood to gain whatever they could take from the expedition. To the Jumano, the Spanish visit to Central Texas late in the seventeenth century may have been viewed as advantageous, regardless of the outcome. But, by all accounts, the Jumano were consummate intercessors who seemed to have been in touch with everyone at once. Jumano representatives in East Texas impressed Anastasius Douay, a French Catholic priest, with their knowledge of the customs of the Catholic Church by making the sign of the cross, kneeling, and clasping their hands, almost certainly learned from Spanish priests. All the while, they were stating that, with French assistance and guns, they could conquer the Spanish (Kelley 1955: 988–989). At almost precisely this same time, Jumano ambassadors were also delivering news of the French colony to Spanish outposts in northern Mexico (Foster 1995, 1998; Kelley 1955). The historian Herbert Bolton (2002) also noted significant complexity and sophistication in Jumano interaction with the Spanish. Bolton suggested that the “Kingdom of the Tejas” was cultivated by western members of the Tejas Alliance for many years in order to keep the Spanish interested in the region. He also doubted that the term “Tejas” denoted anything other than “friend” or “ally” (2002: 61). Bolton pointed to the distinct absence of the term “Tejas” in all of the French documentary evidence, despite the fact that members of the La Salle expedition had lived with the Hasinai, as well as with other Caddo groups (2002: 59). But perhaps the most convincing evidence Bolton presented was his description of Athanase de Mézières’s proposal for how to bring the Comanche under Spanish allegiance in 1778. Mézières suggested offering the “honorable position of allies”: From such a custom comes the name Techán among the natives, which is similar to [alude á] that of commilito, with which the Romans flattered themselves, and results in a close tie of friendship among those who call themselves by this name and in popular opinion that no one break it 242

dIsCUssIon and ConCLUsIon without fearing and incurring the penalty merited by perjurers. (Athanase de Mézières, according to Bolton 2002: 62)

As Bolton noted, the term “Techán” is yet another spelling of Techas, Texias, Texas, and Tejas. So although the Spanish attempted to contact the “Kingdom of the Tejas” (whom they believed to be Caddo) for more than fifty years, various groups within the Tejas Alliance/pax Tejas (among them, the Jumano) were busy masking its precise social, political, and cultural identity from the Spanish. There is little question that the Jumano were engaged in negotiating the outcomes of various situations through the use of multiple identities in multiple dimensions. However, little consideration has been given to the potential ramifications of these outcomes. How, for example, would the colonization of North America have occurred if the Spanish and Jumano managed to become allies? Alternatively, how would a successful Jumano/French alliance and colonization effort have affected the regional geopolitics? How different might the map be if the Jumano had managed to stem the Athapaskan migration south? The Jumano and their homeland were, in fact, central to all of these issues, and this may also have been the case in prehistory. However, by the Historic Period, neither the Spanish nor the French were in a position to offer more than token support to the Jumano. La Salle and most of his colony would soon perish, and the Spanish were concentrating their efforts on retaking New Mexico. It seems likely the Jumano were well aware of this. As Schortman and Urban (1992: 237) state, “People, not societies interact.” Thus, individual identities participate in various dimensions of social interaction through time and space in relation to and in contrast with “others.” These historical examples illustrate how an individual ( Juan Sabeata) and a specific group (the Jumano) within a large region (social field) effectively used their identity as well as the identity of others (in this case, the Tejas, Apache, Spanish, and French) to manipulate their economic, political, and social situation through time. However, members of hunter-gatherer groups, as noted above, seldom possess much in the way of personal material possessions or durable goods. Therefore, we must consider alternative ways in which individuals may have distinguished themselves or achieved status. Bernardini’s (2005) investigation of Hopi prehistoric identity in the American Southwest presents a somewhat similar situation. Cultural boundaries there are often difficult to distinguish because settlement patterns are characterized by a series of uncoordinated and unsynchronized small group 243

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migrations (serial migrations) throughout the region (Bernardini 2005: 46). This can result in intense social interaction, a regional population with very similar archaeological identities, and an inherently unstable cultural landscape, one in which personal accumulations of power and material wealth would have been difficult to acquire and retain (as well as observe archaeologically). One way for individuals to distinguish themselves in such a volatile sociocultural environment is to assume the role or identity of an information broker. In the Southwest, such a strategy could have been implemented by individuals establishing themselves as “middlemen” between migration destinations and populations seeking access to them (Bernardini 2005: 47). This example presents a compelling approach to the role of the individual in social fields. The evidence for intense interaction and potentially unstable social, political, and economic situations in Texas, similar to those in the Southwest, is undeniable. This suggests that individuals able to facilitate communication and interaction among various hunter-gatherer groups and generally assuage a perpetual state of warfare and chaos played a significant role in the region. The documentary evidence presents one such individual, Juan Sabeata, in the Tejas Alliance. Although little is known of Sabeata’s early years, later in life he traveled frequently and was often reported visiting and delivering news to various groups throughout the region. In 1692, Sabeata testified in Parral, Chihuahua, that he was a Christian, baptized at an unspecified date in Parral, and that he was more than fifty years old, suggesting his birth occurred in the late 1630s (Kelley 1955: 987). His age in 1692 indicates that he was alive during early Spanish visits to the Jumano homeland along the Concho River and may well have been alive during, certainly shortly after, the “Miraculous Conversion of the Xumana Nation” in the 1630s. Combined with his baptism in Parral, a major Spanish commercial hub several hundred miles south, these data indicate Sabeata’s long history and extensive experience with the Spanish. His timely arrival in El Paso in 1683, the manner and bearing of his declaration, and the precise types of assistance he was willing to provide the Spanish also support this conclusion. Juan Sabeata’s declaration in 1683 firmly established his identity as a Jumano leader. His presence, along with twelve Jumano captains, and his willingness to speak before and on behalf of the Jumano nation imply his stature as a diplomat and the support of other Jumanos. What then was the nature of this leadership identity and how and with whom did it interact? Kelley (1955) noted that Sabeata appears to have traveled almost continuously across the region and that almost every document containing his name also includes some reference to political, economic, and social activities of other indige244

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nous groups or Europeans. From the time of his declaration in El Paso in 1683, Sabeata was documented among the Hasinai in East Texas, with several different groups in Central Texas, at La Junta de los Rios in West Texas, and in Parral, Chihuahua, on at least two occasions, where he was documented for the last time in 1692 (Kelley 1955: 985–987). Sabeata emerges as an extremely well-traveled and socially astute historical figure with extensive social and political connections throughout the region. This role gave him access to the most current regional geopolitical information, which he often communicated to other indigenous groups as well as to Europeans, occasionally carrying documents between Spanish officials (Foster 1998, Kelley 1955, Kenmotsu 2001, Wade 2003). Moreover, Sabeata’s multiple identities appear to have been forged primarily through his own savvy negotiations in multi-cultural situations. For example, after Sabeata was ousted from the Mendoza-Lopez Expedition in 1684, his ability to lead the Jumano may well have been tenuous. However, fewer than three years later, he and, by extension, the Jumano were back in favor with the Spanish after bringing them physical evidence of the destruction of Fort St. Louis in East Texas (Wade 2003: 142). Thus, within a matter of a few years, Sabeata managed to reinforce his position as leader of the Jumano and regain Spanish confidence to the point that they trusted him to relay information as well as documents. In short, Sabeata appears to have been an individual who distinguished himself socially and politically by serving as a middleman among various culture groups connected by longdistance social networks. Kelley viewed the widespread Jumano social networks as an example of “stimulus diffusion,” suggesting that individuals, such as Sabeata, not only personally transmitted or “diffused” news or “gossip,” but also “technical information regarding such things as ceramic technology, artifact styles, and specific behaviors” (1955: 989). This required learning and distilling specific characteristics of other cultures (e.g., behavior, language, religion, culinary traditions, artifacts, and physiology) and then effectively communicating these to others. Specific archival references of the Jumano describing to others the rituals of the Catholic mass, language, and even the distinctive red hair of Europeans support this idea (Foster 1998, Kelley 1955, Wade 2003). The documentary evidence for the Jumano in general and Juan Sabeata in particular illustrates how individuals and groups share bounty, as well as risk, by adopting, discarding, and/or transforming identities among various social networks and at multiple temporal, spatial, and social scales within a regional social field. Sabeata’s identity among his own people or other groups in the region is far from clear. However, his role as leader of the Jumano in245

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dicates significant local status, and he achieved regional notoriety as a skilled and knowledgeable diplomat among many groups. Thus, Sabeata may well have been viewed in the same light as the !Kung’s t’xudi kaus or “masters of cleverness” (Yellen 1977: 47). Archaeologically, Kelley conceptualized the widespread transmission of Toyah ideas and artifacts as both the direct and indirect results of the Jumano culture group, which he viewed as “long-resident in the region” (1955: 990). He not only viewed the Jumano as consummate masters of regional trade and communication during the early Colonial Period, but also considered the Toyah Focus archaeological evidence for widespread prehistoric Jumano networks (1955). The work presented here is conceptually similar to Kelley’s (1947, 1955), possessing his initial conceptual impetus, but with the benefit of more than sixty additional years of archaeological, historical, ethnographic, and environmental research. Most archaeological models of Toyah also differ from Kelley’s perspective and the concepts presented here in one crucial aspect. In general, archaeologists maintain that there is no clear-cut connection between the prehistoric Toyah and historic Native American groups in Texas. Collins (1995: 385) stipulates a “pre-contact truncation of Toyah culture,” and Johnson (1994) presents A.D. 1650 as a terminal date for Toyah with little or no direct historic linkage. But advances in dating techniques and the increasing numbers of post-contact dates reported from Classic Toyah Area sites make it difficult to ignore the continuity between prehistory and history. Similarly, although it is difficult, if not impossible, to determine which historic groups inhabited what areas, the data presented here clearly document Jumano within Johnson’s Shared or General Toyah Area from the 1580s to the 1690s—a period of more than one hundred years. If Cabeza de Vaca’s “people of the cows” and Coronado’s “Teyas” are eventually determined to be Jumano, the period of Jumano habitation in this area could be extended another fifty years, or more than a quarter of the Toyah Interval. Furthermore, for more than sixty years, the Jumano homeland was consistently documented as lying along the River of Nuts and/or the River of Pearls on the western Edwards Plateau in Central Texas (Salas 1629, Benavides 1632, Castillo and Martin 1650, Guadalajara 1654, Mendoza-Lopez 1683, and Casañas 1691). Several priests, soldiers, and traders visited the Jumano homeland, confirming that this area was inhabited by the Jumano. The Jumano also stated on many occasions that this area was their home, even testifying under oath before Spanish governors. This is as close to self-ascription as archaeologists are likely to come. However, to say that Toyah was Jumano, or vice versa, is far too simplistic. 246

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In the most precise terms, historical evidence places the Jumano in the northwest portion of Johnson’s (1994) Classic Toyah Area from A.D. 1629 (perhaps as early as the mid- 1500s) until at least A.D. 1691 when they were documented by Casañas along with dozens of other groups as members of the Tejas Alliance. Therefore, the prehistoric Toyah peoples’ range clearly overlapped (spatially and temporally) with the historic Jumano on the western Edwards Plateau for perhaps as many as 150 years and certainly no fewer than 30 years. Thus, there is little doubt that the Jumano contributed to the archaeological record on the western Edwards Plateau. The Jumano may be viewed as one group among many that together formed, maintained, and reproduced the social, economic, and political networks of the Tejas Alliance/social field. As Casañas clearly stated, the Tejas Alliance did not consist of a single group, and it is extremely unlikely that Toyah represents one people. However, due to its location, size, and temporal position immediately prior to the Tejas Alliance, Toyah material culture seems a likely prehistoric candidate for the Tejas social field. Furthermore, regardless of where most archaeologists set the beginning and end of the Toyah period (A.D. 1250 vs. A.D. 1300 or A.D. 1650 vs. A.D. 1700), the early European contact period spans almost half of this interval. Therefore, many of the people participating in the Tejas Alliance/social field recorded by Casañas in 1691 were first- and second-generation descendants of Toyah peoples. For example, Juan Sabeata testified in 1692 that he was more than fifty years old, which means he was born sometime prior to A.D. 1650. There seems little reason to categorize the pre–A.D. 1650 Sabeata as “Toyah” and the post–A.D. 1650 Sabeata as “Jumano.” In the same sense that one never steps in the same culture twice, the Toyah social field of A.D. 1650 was different from the Tejas social field of A.D. 1691. The Texas of 1969 was certainly a different place from the Texas of 2010 (coincidentally, a span of forty-one years). People interact with multiple identities in complex social relationships at multiple scales everyday and many of these roles and relationships change through time. But this does not negate the persistence and/or continuity of some elements of culture through time. With respect to specific identities, it is unlikely that most historically documented groups in Texas will ever be matched to specific archaeological sites. But in terms of distinguishing sociocultural identity and defining patterns of interaction among hunter-gatherer groups, greater resolution is possible. The key to achieving this is to focus on documenting variation and to emphasize culture as a continuum. Kelley conceptualized the long- distance transmission of behavior, artifacts, and customs between the American Southwest and Southeast, Great 247

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Plains, and Mexico as a process of interaction similar to those presented here. Nearly sixty years ago, Kelley urged archaeologists in Texas to view interregional processes and social interaction with a more open mind: Perhaps if archaeologists were less preoccupied with their search for the campsites or other material evidence of the putative “migrants” through or around the Texas cultural sink and more alive to the significance of the observed behavior of groups such as the Jumano and the Coahuiltecans, the question of Mexican-Southeastern contacts would appear much less a problem. (Kelley 1955: 982)

This book echoes Kelley’s words, suggesting a long in situ cultural development in Central Texas combined with extensive and intensive regional interaction through the long-distance networks of an ancient social field. Although the same basic social field may have spanned prehistory and history, the identities and interactions involved did not remain unchanged or static for long. The initial pandemic caused by European-introduced diseases decimated indigenous populations in this region. The subsequent introduction of horses and firearms, combined with more epidemics, increased the tempo and severity of change in almost every facet of indigenous political, economic, and social organization. By the end of the seventeenth century, firearms and horses were traded and used extensively in the region, and it is likely that networks within the Tejas social field facilitated the spread of both. Some archaeologists attribute the truncation of prehistoric material culture at this time to rapid population decline due to disease. There is no doubt that disease had a terrible impact on indigenous peoples, but there were also other factors at work. For example, simultaneous with population decline was the introduction of new technology, primarily firearms, and far greater mobility due to the introduction of the horse. This meant that by the late seventeenth century, smaller populations of indigenous people were occupying fewer sites for briefer periods, and many had already begun to implement new or at least different technologies and practices in place of more traditional ones. The rapid selection of new technologies and the adoption of new strategies were necessary in order for indigenous peoples to survive. Nevertheless, this entailed the dissolution of many prehistoric practices and technologies and, by extension, the end of the prehistoric material record, at least in terms of archaeological visibility. However, it would be a mistake to conclude that all these transformations were due solely to European influence. The Athapaskan migration into Texas began as early as A.D. 1400 and resulted, along with changing environmental 248

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fIgUre 9.3 Depiction of the approximate rate and extent of the Apache migration into the Toyah/Tejas social field between A.D. 1400 and A.D. 1684 (Arnn 2007).

conditions, in the decline and, perhaps, migration south of more sedentary Panhandle agricultural groups, such as the Antelope Creek peoples (Boyd 1997). Coronado’s accounts suggest that by A.D. 1540, the Athapaskans had extended their range as far south as the Red River, and in 1598, the Zaldívar Expedition reported Apaches on the “Buffalo Plains” attempting to enlist the support of the Spanish against the Jumano. Between approximately A.D. 1625 and 1655, Spanish missionaries and soldiers noted the increasing presence as well as hostility of Apaches in and around the New Mexico colony. The Pueblo Revolt and Spanish retreat from New Mexico in A.D. 1680 strengthened Native American influence, at least in the short term, but also facilitated the Athapaskan expansion south. Apache raids were reported by Jumano living on the Edwards Plateau in 1684, and in 1691, Casañas listed the Apache as enemies of the Tejas. By A.D. 1700, despite a resurgence of Spanish power in the region, the Apache managed to extend their range throughout most of the Southwest (Figure 9.3). The rate of political, economic, and social change in the region at this time 249

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is nothing short of astonishing. Within a hundred years of the founding of New Mexico, both the Jumano and the Caddo had acquired horses and firearms, and in fewer than fifty years, the Apache had overrun most of Texas south to the Concho River. Much of this occurred in what Casañas and Joutel documented as the territory or range of Tejas Alliance groups, particularly the Jumano. Thus, in less than half a century, approximately 50 percent of the Tejas social field, in existence for perhaps four hundred years, vanished. Ironically, beginning in the mid-eighteenth century, the Apache were soon threatened by yet another Native American group from the north, the Comanche. The archaeology and history of Texas can certainly be characterized by significant and rapid change. But the story of Texas is also characterized by the long-term persistence of traditions in specific areas. For example, archaeological data from Central and South Texas indicate that broad-spectrum foraging was the rule for at least the last seven thousand years. Thus, a large portion of Texas prehistory presents an enduring foraging tradition rivaling that of the Great Basin. Moreover, this tradition, perpetuated by geographic diversity, almost certainly provided the initial impetus for a social field. It also seems likely that over millennia many social fields rose and fell in this region throughout prehistory. In fact, many prehistoric archaeological cultures have been identified in Texas based primarily on the distribution of specific lithic assemblages and projectile points. For example, the Scallorn arrow point, indicative of the Late Prehistoric I or Austin Phase, immediately preceding the Toyah Interval/Late Prehistoric II Period, is as widespread as the Perdiz arrowhead, and the Pedernales dart point of the Late Archaic Period is also widespread. Thus, the regional distributions of projectile points—evidenced by Pedernales points in the early Late Archaic Period, Scallorn in the Late Prehistoric I, and Perdiz in the Late Prehistoric II—may differentiate various widespread networks (i.e., social fields), perhaps among many of the same groups of people over thousands of years. It is also likely that there is some significance in the fact that the distribution of these points appears to be centered on the Edwards Plateau. Clearly, there is compelling evidence for the development of an enduring hunter-gatherer tradition, as well as social fields, in Texas. Although it is unclear if there is continuity between fields, archaeological evidence from Australia, where some prehistoric traditions spanned tens of thousands of years, suggests some interesting possibilities. It is also important to keep in mind that we have only scratched the surface of the archaeological record in Texas 250

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and there is still much to learn. Therefore, we must constantly remind ourselves of what we do and do not know while striving to keep an open mind. Along these same lines, perhaps it is time to consider the original Native American term “Tejas” for both Toyah and the Tejas Alliance and if prehistory and history must be divided: “Tejas I” for the prehistoric and “Tejas II” for the Historic Period. In fact, a province of New Spain, subsequently a state of Mexico, followed by the Republic of Texas, and finally the State of Texas were all named for an extensive and populous alliance of different peoples known as Tejas. How better to acknowledge the indigenous origins and antiquity of the region than by restoring its indigenous name?

ContInUUm: Past, Present, and fUtUre This book provides an anthropological reconstruction of Late Prehistory and Early History in Texas with a specific focus on hunter-gatherers in that region. At about the same time that Toyah material culture began to be distributed throughout Texas, the ancestors of many Americans alive today were emerging from the Dark Ages of medieval Europe, entering the Iron Age in sub–Saharan Africa, or participating in the Golden Age of Islam. In the Far East, imperial China had standardized weights and measures as well as the width of roads, bridges, and cart axles centuries earlier in order to integrate transportation and commerce. Although Chinese advances revolved around a totalitarian enforcement of Confucian principles, the Golden Age of Islam was the result of a passionate religious movement backed by significant military support. Similarly, a few centuries later, European empires, underwritten by military and religious backing began the conquest of the Americas, contributing to Europe’s own Golden Age, the Renaissance. As different as these historical settings seem, it is still possible to see the similarities, differences, and linkages among them. In fact, our world today is still shaped by descendant forces generated during these distant times, places, and peoples. Mathematics, including our “modern” number system, as well as biology and medicine were developed and taught by Islamic scholars in some of the world’s first universities. Gunpowder, rice, and noodles all originated in the Far East, and China boasts a medical tradition spanning thousands of years. Similarly, foodstuffs from the Americas (e.g., tomatoes, potatoes, and corn) are found in every country on the planet. The events that shaped and continue to shape the “modern” world are so entwined that they can no longer be neatly separated from the cultures, 251

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societies, and civilizations of the past. Instead, these events are simply points along a continuum. The inclusion of foodstuffs above was not accidental. Food can be a particularly subtle but nonetheless profound indicator of practice as well as persistence, change, and resistance. Those who believe that the cultural heritage of the Americas disappeared as its religious icons were melted into silver and gold ingots should consider the tons of corn and potatoes consumed daily around the world. Nor should these concepts be limited to “complex” agricultural civilizations; much the same can be said for huntergatherer societies and, perhaps, of the Tejas Alliance. A point emphasized throughout this book is that despite direct reliance on wild resources in the immediate vicinity, foragers frequently offset fluctuations and shortages by developing and maintaining extensive and, often, intensive relationships with other people. This requires significant cultural flexibility and some mobility on the part of the participants in order to adapt to different environments, situations, and neighbors. Thus, foragers had a lot invested in simply getting along with each other. Nor were all relationships necessarily reinforced with great frequency. Some people may not have seen each other for years while others may have interacted on a more or less seasonal basis. In short, foragers were heavily vested in forming identities and establishing and maintaining social relationships. A very narrow interpretation of this behavioral trait might suggest that foragers were simply very good at putting up with their neighbors in order to mitigate the capricious conditions of their environment. However, a more comprehensive assessment indicates that this behavioral adaptation linked a large region for approximately four hundred years and was, in part, responsible for stemming the expansion of at least two large European empires and one indigenous migration for approximately two hundred years. Moreover, anthropologists point to the same behavioral trait among all modern hunter-gatherers. It is likely that this adaptive trait has been an integral part of forager behavior for tens of thousands of years and that in its later permutations (say, over the last one hundred thousand or so years) it may have become more than a simple knee-jerk reaction to environmental stimuli. These same concepts of identity and social interaction practiced at multiple temporal and spatial scales, when applied to contemporary situations, also present a compelling argument for a broader holistic and thus more anthropological approach to contemporary human social, economic, and political issues. In fact, the forager knack for getting along with each other may very well prove to be the single greatest achievement of humanity. It would be a shame to lose such 252

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a useful trait as the global population approaches seven billion people—all requiring clean air, water, and food. The ability to get along with one’s neighbors should not be dismissed out of hand, nor should it be viewed as some sort of romanticized trait of the noble savage. It does not mean that there was no division of labor, that bad things did not happen to good people, and that there were no bullies in prehistory. Egalitarian societies are egalitarian in the sense that one person’s opinion does not matter more than another’s. Furthermore, when social relationships become strained, moving is generally a viable option for foragers, whereas among farmers and modern city-dwellers, this may not be possible. Despite great diversity in terms of resource procurement, hunter-gatherers also possessed a similar combination of practices that maintained diversity and supported cultural flexibility (Kent 1996: 13). These included a loose attachment to the group (partly due to their mobility patterns); individual autonomy regardless of gender and, in some cases, regardless of age; and a set of beliefs and values that are fluid and non-dogmatic (Kent 1996: 13). It is this group of traits, far beyond any specific way of gathering or form of hunting, that sets foragers apart from other peoples and defines them on the basis of culture. If these traits seem oddly familiar, it is because many of these same qualities are held in high esteem by Americans today. Some of these characteristics were also highly regarded by the founding fathers of the United States of America. For example, Thomas Jefferson, a chief architect of the U.S. Constitution, conducted some of the first archaeological investigations in the United States and credited the ancestors of contemporary Native Americans with the construction of the mound culture once prevalent throughout much of the eastern United States. In fact, some elements of our government derive from Native American political structure. So if such traits ring familiar among most humans, it is because they constitute a recurring behavioral theme among our species in general as part of a hunter-gatherer heritage spanning perhaps hundreds of thousands of years. Nevertheless, the cultural and/or behavioral practices and traits that define foragers were developed by humans for survival rather than from any idealistic or indulgent sense of an individual’s self-worth. In terms of feeding and sheltering oneself and family, it is immaterial whether we consider individuals as special or not. This is perhaps the most unadulterated meaning of egalitarianism. No one holds a privileged place above any other. From this perspective, it is irrelevant if each individual is precious or we hate everyone equally and without exception. The point is that this system worked because it was 253

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ultimately more practical to get along than to not get along. In this sense, whether one chooses, as a popular bumper sticker once advised, to “practice random acts of kindness” or, alternatively, to “execute precise acts of logic,” the result may be the same. Modern individuals, families, and groups still develop and cultivate identities in order to achieve specific goals and objectives in interaction with others, and we are still significantly influenced by the past and our environment. On a global scale, during the last century many of the world’s resources were devoted to the economic and political struggle between capitalism and Marxism. Despite the fact that both used formidable political identities at multiple temporal and spatial scales to achieve goals, each of these identities was based on an economic system. Thus, despite sharp political and ideological differences, capitalism and Marxism, as identities defined in opposition, focused attention on the control of economic resources at a time when the world’s population began to increase significantly. The world’s population is still growing and, at more than 6.5 billion, humans as a whole, despite all our accomplishments, have not stabilized ourselves with respect to the resources that sustain us. In fact, we have greatly complicated matters by becoming almost wholly dependent on nonrenewable resources to supply virtually everything we need. Anyone who thinks that identity and interaction are insignificant must ask themselves how more than six billion people became dependent on resources that are often located on the far side of the planet. In some ways, the global community may be viewed as a social field run amok. There is, of course, no going back at this point, and few would want to. It is good to be warm in the winter and cool in the summer and safe and dry all year. Even if we wished, we cannot simply walk out the door into the woods and become foragers again. There is no vast wilderness to retreat to any longer. Realistically, the wild places of Earth are extremely limited—some would say they are all but gone—and it remains to be seen whether we can protect what is left. Very soon, short of a pandemic or a nuclear war (still significant possibilities), we will share this planet with seven billion people. Referring to this mind-boggling figure, the late Kurt Vonnegut Jr. remarked, “I suppose they’ll all expect to be treated with dignity.” In 1973, Charlton Heston starred in the movie Soylent Green in which a not-so-distant future-Earth is warming due to greenhouse gases, the oceans are dead due to overfishing and pollution, the entire planet is overpopulated, and food riots are weekly events. The protagonist discovers that in addition to seizing rioters, the government is processing them into crackers, which are then distributed to the general population as “Soylent Green.” In the 254

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final moments of the film, the mortally wounded protagonist lies in an overcrowded church and cries out, “Soylent Green is people!” In the twenty-first century, we are not quite Soylent Green, but we are facing some very serious and similar problems and we cannot simply run off to a less populated area and wait until things blow over. We may not all need dignity, but we do require clean air, water, and food, and, in this sense, the human condition has changed little in two hundred thousand years. However, if civilization and industrialization have taught us nothing else, they have clearly demonstrated that our world and many of its resources are finite. This knowledge, coupled with an ever-increasing population, is cause for concern. It is imperative that we establish and cultivate individual and group identities capable of interacting and implementing strategies to achieve specific goals, such as a sustainable human population and basic resources. Coming to terms with our ever-expanding population and finite resources is not a peripheral or esoteric indulgence, nor is this a discussion of economics or politics divided along liberal or conservative lines. In fact, the solution to these issues and the continuation of human life depend on the interactive identities and egalitarianism of hunter-gatherer societies. Ultimately, survival will require a very fundamental but, nonetheless, significant skill, one that our forager ancestors were very adept at—social interaction. The world is a much smaller place and what may make the difference, paradoxically, is a renewed focus on egalitarian ideals and more social interaction. As the climate warms, population increases, arable land diminishes, and sea levels rise, we must work closely with each other in order to maintain this world for our descendants. Our success or failure in this venture may also be viewed as a fundamental step in human evolution. To fail will mean the end of human life and no doubt many other living things. If we succeed, we stand to inherit the stars. Our ancestors faced similarly complex and dire situations and succeeded. Certainly “the masters of cleverness” were up to this task. Are we?

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Index

agriculturalist: archaeological correlates, 7, 30; definition of, 8; social organization, 236 alude á/commilito, 242–243 Apaches (Athapaskans/Querechos), 46; European contact, 94–99, 128; expansion of territory, 93, 101, 130, 139, 239–240, 248–250; as Jumano enemies, 93–94, 101, 128–132, 230, 240– 242; Pueblo raids, 126, 130 Argentina, 131 asi (black drink), 78 Austin Phase: definition of, 167–168; problems with, 167–169, 186 Australian Aborigines, 34, 38, 250 Ayjado, 92, 199, 230. See also Cuitoa; Excanxaque/Excanjaque band: archaeological correlates, 13, 31–35, 38, 42–43; definition of, 11–15, 28, 33– 34; historical, 38, 142; social interaction, 36–38, 46–50, 69, 235, 237. See also community/band Basarwa (Bushman, Kalahari foragers and hunter-gatherers): group size and distribution, 229, 232; material culture and identity, 30–31, 42–43; projectile points as indicators of sociocultural identity, 206; social interaction, 44– 50; social organization, 25, 44 behavioral (cultural, sociocultural) base-

line (expectations), 69, 119–120, 131, 136, 234 Benavides, Fray Alonzo, 107–108, 128, 238, 246 bison: absence in Austin Phase sites, 184– 185; Caddo, 180, 198–199; Dillehay presence-absence model, 60, 72, 74– 75, 224; Jumano, 123, 125–127; Karankawa, 117–118, 179; Late Archaic, 159– 161; Native American reliance on, 5, 98, 100–101, 122, 173–174, 177, 179– 180; opportunistic predation, 79, 224– 225; range of, 53–57, 60, 75–76, 91, 224; specific habitat, 4, 57, 74–76, 126, 155–156, 192; Teyas, 98; Toyah, 59, 62–63, 66, 70, 193; trade in hides, 92, 94, 106, 108–110 Bolton, Herbert, 137–138, 242–243 Bosque-Larios Expedition, 60, 113, 119 Bourdieu, Pierre, 68 bow and arrow, 168 Braidwood, Robert (readiness hypothesis), 165 Buckeye Knoll site (41VT98), 151–152 Buckhollow site (41KM16), 64; as example of Johnson’s “Classic Toyah Culture,” 193 burned rock features: carbohydrate revolution, 157; formation and patterning of middens, 156–159, 162–164, 166; geophytes, 57–58; middens, 57–58, 152,

L and of the tejas 224; thermal retention, 156; Toyah, 57–58; unlined vs. lined hearths, 222– 224; veneer vs. continuity of middens in Late Prehistoric Period, 189 Cabeza de Vaca, Álvar Núñez: compared to Coronado Expedition, 83–84; Karankawa, 117; Mariames, 118–119; prickly pear, 155; social interaction, 60; Teyas, 246 Caddo: archaeology, 52, 58, 133, 180, 198– 199, 235, 237; asi (black drink), 78; contact with French, 133, 240, 242; Jumano, 123, 128, 250; sociocultural identity, 30, 52; Tejas alliance, 236–238 carbohydrate revolution, 157 Casañas de Jesús María, Francisco, 9, 99; definition of Tejas, 9, 134–138; Tejas alliance, 134–138, 239, 246–247 Castaño de Sosa, Gaspar, 125 Castillo-Martín Expedition, 60, 91–92, 110–111, 126, 139, 246 ceramics: Central Texas, 181–182; Central Texas Coast, 58, 179; East Central Texas, 58, 180; East Texas, 180–181; as indicator of sociocultural boundary, 58; Lower Pecos, 173; North Central Texas, 175–177; Panhandle Plains, 174; Trans Pecos, 174–175 cemeteries: absence of Toyah cemeteries, 78–79; changes through time, 78; Early Archaic (Buckeye Knoll), 151– 152; as indicators of population density and territorial markers, 153–154; Late Archaic, 153–154, 158, 163–164; Late Prehistoric, 178 Chamuscado and Rodríguez Expedition, 87, 89 chert: distribution of in Texas, 183, 197; Edwards Plateau, 157–158 China, 251 chronology, cultural: basis for in Texas, 145–146; problems with, 145–146, 168

chronology, Toyah, 63–65 Clovis, 148 Comanche, 242–243, 250; commilito, 242 commilito/alude á, 242–243 community/band, 112, 121–124, 234–235, 237; archaeological correlates, 13, 31– 35, 38, 42–43; definition of, 11–15, 28, 33–34; historical, 142; relationship with environment, 67–68; social interaction, 36–38, 46–50 Concho River: as sociocultural boundary, 126–127, 129, 223–226, 229–230, 244, 250 Coronado Expedition, 83–84, 87–88, 94– 100, 107–108, 120, 246, 249 Cuitoa, 92, 101, 199, 230. See also Ayjado; Excanxaque/Excanjaque cultural ecology, 66–79 daily practice: Cabeza de Vaca, 84; role in identity, 44, 69 deer (white tail): frequency and distribution, 191; habits, 191–192, 197; Native American reliance on, 117–118, 158, 197, 221, 225, 229; Perdiz points, 191; population density, 73, 156, 197; trade in hides, 92, 94, 102, 106, 108–109 DeSoto-Moscoso Expedition, 87, 120, 245 diffusion: definition, 166; Late Archaic, 166, 169 Dillehay, Tom D., 60, 71 disease, 88–90, 103, 104, 132, 248 Dobe (!Kung), 49 dogs, 125 Douay, Anastasius, 242 Durkheim, Emile, 69 ecotone, 152 El Paso (Río del Norte), 92, 127, 240, 244–245 encomiendas, 90, 238 environment (Texas): Central Texas, 157– 158; changes at end of Pleistocene,

296

Index temporary perceptions of, 19–27; definition of, 5–6, 24, 252–253; diet/ nutritional needs, 5, 194–195; egalitarianism, 25, 253; enduring tradition of, 5, 144–145, 252; group size and distribution on the landscape, 30–35, 229; historical, 142; homogenous social identity in environmentally variable regions, 40–51; identity, 7, 11–12, 28, 44–51, 67–70, 81, 243, 247; identity and material culture, 30–35, 42–43, 44–51, 243; Kalahari, 40–43, 46–50; qualitative issues, 17–18; social interaction, 14–16, 35, 36–38, 46–51, 63, 71–72, 132, 139, 239–240, 243, 245, 252–253; social field, 37–38, 243; “specialized” broad-spectrum foragers, 164; Tejas alliance, 236

149–152; regional, 3–5; social interaction, 36–37; stabilization during Archaic, 153–154; Toyah, 72–74 environment (Kalahari), 40–42 Espejo-Luxan Expedition, 87, 89, 107– 108, 123 ethnicity, 29–30, 112–113 Excanxaque/Excanjaque, 92, 199, 230. See also Ayjado; Cuitoa expeditions: differences in documentary evidence, 83–84; differential impact on Native Americans, 83–84, 87–89 fire, 6, 22, 223 Fort Saint Louis, 245 French, 101, 102–103, 105–106, 113, 115, 120, 133, 237, 239–240, 242–243, 245 Garza Complex, 129–131 Gediondo: campsite, 230; as Jumano allies, 230; link to Cielo-like structures near modern-day Iraan, 230 geophyte: description and relationship to burned rock features, 57–58; processing and relationship to middens, 156–157 group, 13, 235–237; definition, 68–69, 112– 113; lists of Native American, 113–116 Guadalajara Expedition, 60, 91–92, 111, 126, 139, 246 Guerrero (mission) projectile point, 139– 141 Hadza, 46 Hardesty, Donald, 131 Hasinai (Asinai, Assenay, Cenis), 9, 52, 133–136, 142, 237, 242, 245 Hatcher, Mattie, 135–138 Heston, Charleton, 254 Hobbes, Thomas, 17–18 humanitus, 39–40 hunter-gatherer/forager, 2, 7–8, 128, 252– 253; Central Kalahari, 40–51; con-

identity (sociocultural identity): advantages of changing, 39–40, 243, 245; definition and construction of, 10–11, 28–30, 68–69, 126, 234–235; fundamental scales of identity, 11, 12–16, 30–35, 201–202; homogenizing factors, 40–51; hunter-gatherer/forager, 11–12, 81, 30–35, 37–51, 67–70, 243, 245, 247; in prehistoric archaeological record, 29–35, 50, 247; stylistic variation among social groups, 44–45 Islam, 251 Jefferson, Thomas, 253 Johnson, Lee Roy: Classic vs. Shared Toyah Areas, 199; concept of “Classic Toyah Culture,” 193–194, 197, 247; “Zeus,” 189. See also Buckhollow site (41KM16) Joutel, Henri, 60, 103, 113, 115, 119, 121– 123; Hasinai alliance, 100, 133–136, 139 Jumano (Choman, Choumay, Chuman, Humana, Jumana, Xumana): allies, 123, 131, 133–135; ambassadors, 133, 242,

297

L and of the tejas various regional material cultures, 169– 182 Lesser, Alexander, 37–38, 63, 139, 235 Little Sunday Complex, 160–161 long-distance social networks/social field: archaeological correlates, 14–16, 37–38, 63, 71–72, 112, 116, 132, 139 lunate stone, 161

245–246; Apache encounters, 93, 128– 132; captains, 92, 122, 244; Hasinai (Caddo), 99–100, 133–136; homeland, 91, 110–111, 123, 126, 142, 229–230, 243–244, 246, 250; Humana/Xumana/ Salinas Pueblos, 91, 93, 125, 130, 132, 238; language, 127–128, 230; leadership, 244–246; “Miraculous Conversion of the Xumana Nation,” 91, 238, 244; rancherías, 122–124; reconstruction of marriage/linguistic group, 229–231; Spanish interaction, 90–94, 101–104, 106–111, 134, 230, 237–245; subsistence, 126, 128; trade, 91–92, 102, 106–109, 136, 246 Kalahari, 40–43, 45, 46, 229, 232 Karankawa (Copanes, Coapites, Cujanes, Carancaguases, and Cocos), 52, 58, 101, 117–119, 142, 199, 213–214 Karst, 158 Kelley, J. Charles: definition of Toyah, 52–56; distribution of Toyah, 191, 246; Juan Sabeata, 132, 244–248; Jumano, 136, 244–248 Kua (Basarwa/Bushman), 42–43, 46 !Kung (Basarwa/Bushman), 46–50 La Juntos de los Ríos/La Junta, 89, 119, 123, 127, 132–133, 136 language, 142; Kalahari, 45 La Salle, René-Robert Cavalier, Sier de: and his Expedition/Colony, 101, 103, 105, 120, 133, 239–240, 242–243 Late Archaic Period: definition, 163–168; diffusion, 166; Little Sunday Complex, 160–161; lunate stone, 161; population growth, 163–164; stabilization of biotic communities, 164; and various regional material cultures, 154–163; Wylie pits, 162 Late Prehistoric Period: definition, 167– 169; problems with database, 186; and

Malinowski, Bronislaw, 29 Mariames, 118–119 marriage/linguistic group: archaeological correlates, 13–15, 34–35, 142, 209–233; definition of, 11–12, 14–15, 34–35; historical evidence, 142, 235; linguistic evidence in Texas, 142, 214–217; seasonal aggregation and dispersion, 117–119, 121 masters of cleverness/t’xudi kaus, 50, 246, 255 Mauss, Marcel, 68–69 Mendoza-Lopez Expedition, 60, 102, 110– 111, 113, 127–128, 134, 139, 241–242, 246 Mézières, Athanase de, 242 mongongo nuts, 195 Monte Verde (Chile), 6, 71, 148–149 mussels: freshwater, 5, 195; nutritional information of marine, 195 New Mexico, 90–92 obraje, 110 Otomoacos, 89 Paleo-Indians, 148–149 Parisii, Monica, 131 pecans: density, 154; relationship to Toyah sites, 194–195 Pecos River: Espejo-Luxan Expedition, 123 peopling of the Americas, 6, 21, 147–149 Perdiz projectile point: bilateral sym-

298

Index metry/asymmetry, 206–208; as diagnostic indicator of Toyah, 191–193; distribution, 129, 191, 204–205, 209; historical evidence for and disappearance of, 139–142; as indicator of a social field, 204, 250; morphological characteristics, 204–209; potential for demonstrating sociocultural identity, 131, 205–209; Red River boundary, 129; relationship to white-tailed deer, 191–192; as social currency, 209 Pleistocene, 147–152 populus romanus, 39 Prairie Caddo (Shafer Model), 180, 198–199 precipitation/rainfall: Central and South Texas, 195–197 primitive isolate, 63 Protohistoric Period, 86–87 Pueblo Revolt, 90, 92–93, 101, 126–127, 238, 240, 242, 249 Querechos, 94–99, 120, 129–130 Quivira (Quivirans), 94–95, 100, 120; Caddo language family, 100; protohistoric Wichita, 100; tattooing, 100 ranchería, 13, 89, 117, 122–127, 142 readiness hypothesis (Robert Braidwood), 165 Red River, 5, 97–98, 129 residential base camp/site: characteristics of, 195–200; historical, 142; Late Archaic, 165; population and distribution on the landscape, 30–35; rancherías, 13, 89, 117, 122–127, 142; significance to sociocultural identity, 13–14; significance to Toyah, 15 Romanization, 39–40 Sabeata, Juan, 92–93, 102–104, 110–111, 117, 127, 132–133, 231, 238–239, 242– 247

Salas Expedition, 60, 91, 126, 246 San (Basarwa/Bushman), 45 serial migration, 244 Serrano, Hernán Martín, 110–111 Serrano, Hernándo/Fernando Martín, 110–111, 127 social field/long-distance social networks: archaeological correlates, 14–16, 35, 37–38, 112, 116, 132, 139; role of the individual, 243–247; Toyah/Tejas, 235–236, 245–248, 250 Social Identity Theory, 27 Soylent Green, 254–255 sub-Saharan Africa: complementarity with Central and South Texas, 70, 251 Talon brothers, 101, 133 tattoo, 95, 97, 100, 125 Taylor, Walter, 163 Techan, 242–243 Tejas/Texias/Tejias, 3, 9, 15, 86, 92, 127; meaning, 99, 134–136, 242–244, 249, 251 Tejas alliance, 121, 134–138, 140–141, 143, 235–239, 242–244, 247, 252 Tejas I and Tejas II, 251 Tejas social field, 139–140, 143, 235–236, 247–248, 250 Texas (general): flora, fauna, and geography, 3–5; size (Central and South Texas), 52; temperature (Central and South Texas), 195–197 Teya, 94–100, 120, 124, 129–131, 142 Tierra Blanca Complex, 129 Toyah, 9; antecedent technology, 186–189, 235; association with bison, 53–57, 62– 63; association with features (burned rock), 57–58; as broad-spectrum foragers, 74–76; cemeteries (absence of ), 78–79; characteristics of residential base camps/sites, 195–200; chronology, 63–65; definitions and perceptions,

299

L and of the tejas 52–61, 250; distribution of residential base camps across the landscape, 219– 233; ecoregions, 74; historic or prehistoric phenomenon, 10, 64–65, 138, 235; homogenous character of archaeology, 60–61; Johnson’s “Toyah Culture” (“Shared” and “Classic”), 58, 193, 246, 247; Jumano, 246–248; models of, 62–66; as multiple marriage/linguistic groups, 209–219; “regionalism,” 58; as single Classic marriage/linguistic group, 15, 59, 219–233; as social field, 15, 202–209, 235–236, 247, 250; subsistence, 56–60; Toyah region as defined by Johnson (Figure 3.4), 59 Toyah ceramic assemblage: asi (black drink), 78; description, 53; neighboring, 58; reasons for adoption, 76–79; various bone-tempered pottery forms (Figure 3.3), 55 Toyah lithic assemblage: antecedents of, 186–189, 235; description, 52–53; dis-

tribution, 191–193; examples of (Figure 3.2), 54; purpose, 76, 174 trade: firearms, 102, 104, 140, 240, 248, 250; French–Native American, 242; horses, 85, 87, 109, 240–241, 248, 250; Jumano-Caddo, 128, 250; JumanoPueblo, 108, 128; Jumano-Spanish, 110–111; Plains-Pueblo, 107–108; Spanish–Native American, 107–110 t’xudi kaus/masters of cleverness, 50, 246, 255 Vonnegut, Kurt Jr., 254 Wade, Mariah, 8 Wilson, Edward O., 67 Wylie pits, 162 Yaupon holly (Ilex vomitoria), 78 Zaldívar Expedition, 87, 101, 249

300