Caddo Landscapes in the East Texas Forests by Perttula Tim;

Author:Perttula, Tim;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxbow Books
Published: 2017-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

Fig. 85. Village areas near the primary platform mound:

a. Village Plot excavations and village areas;

b. WPA Village Plot 1 excavations

The platform mound at the Hatchel site was constructed over at least two specialized structures at what was the original ground surface (Zone K). These structures consisted of a very large circular structure (Feature 25) with an internal partition (Fig. 86a–b) and a structure of unknown size marked by an extensive ash deposit. The few artifacts that have been recovered from Zone K – as well as an artifact assemblage from nearby Village Area I (see Perttula and Nelson 2003) that is believed to be associated with Zone K – suggests that these structures were an important and central part of a pre-AD 1300 Caddo community at the Hatchel site, and remained so in the memories and ceremonies of later Nasoni Caddo peoples. By c. AD 1450, the first stages of the platform mound were constructed (Zone I–J) (Fig. 87) over the Zone K structures, and a ramp was built along the southern side of the mound, heading down into the Nasoni Caddo village that had grown up at Hatchel. These first stages of the platform mound did not have temple structures constructed on them.

The second stage in the construction of the platform mound at the Hatchel site was a stratified series of constructed structures on the northern part of the mound platform (Table 5). Most of this construction took place after c. AD 1550, and may have lasted until c. AD 1690, although no European artifacts have been recovered from any of these mound deposits. These structures were in eight different mound zones (Zones A–H), in many cases with structures superimposed over one another, even though they were separated by mound fill. There were 16 circular structures in the mound structure zones, ranging from one (Zones F and G) (Fig. 88), two (Zones A–E) and three (Zone H) structures per zone (Fig. 89a–b); a third structure in Zone B appears to have been a granary, not a specialized structure associated with rituals and ceremonies on the platform mound. That most of the zones have two structures – situated at the eastern and western ends of the platform – may be an expression of the basic duality identified by Sabo (2012: 439, 441) in Caddo cosmology and social organization, and the fact that different rituals were performed in these simultaneously used Nasoni Caddo temple structures. In Zones F, G and H, other cosmological and social rituals and principles of the spirit realm expressed in deliberate spatial differences from later mound structures zones may have held sway.

Fig. 86. Feature 25: a. plan map; b. Feature 25 and its interior partition (image 41BW3-265, Texas Archeological Research Laboratory, University of Texas at Austin)

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