Crossroads, p. 37
The Plaquemine people were slow to adopt agriculture, compared to the Mississippians. They preferred the old hunting and gathering ways, and they remained distinct from the Mississippians in language and culture.
(The Mississippians were not the only people in Arkansas during the Mississippian era. In southwest Arkansas and adjacent parts of Louisiana, Texas, and Oklahoma, the Caddo people maintained their own language and culture. Unlike the Mississippians, the Caddo lived on small farmsteads scattered about the countryside. They had no villages or towns. They built platform mounds and burial mounds at convenient locations and periodically everyone in the scattered communities would gather at these places--archaeologists call them ceremonial centers--for religious and civil ceremonies.)
(Clay pipes of the early and middle Caddo periods. The long
stemmed pipe at the bottom is the earliest. Pipe smoking was an important
part of many ceremonies. Men and probably women also smoked after meals
for pleasure. The Caddo grew their own tobacco. Besides smoking it in pipes,
they powdered it and mixed it with bear oil or buffalo fat for use as incense.)
(This map depicts the
territory of the Caddo people in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas,
and Louisiana. The map is taken from John R. Swanton's Source Material
on the History and Ethnology of the Caddo Indians : "Former Distribution
of the Caddo Indians." Swanton's map is based on historical accounts
of tribal distributions and alliances early in the seventeenth century.
At that time, according to Swanton, there were three or four loose "confederations"
of Caddo tribes: The Hasinai of east Texas, the Kadohadacho of
the Great Bend region of the Red River Valley in northeast Texas, northwest
Louisiana, southwest Arkansas, and southwest Oklahoma; and the Natchitoches
(pronounced "Nacketish") of west-central Lousiana.)
In southwest Arkansas, and adjacent parts of Louisiana, Texas, and Oklahoma, the Caddo people also maintained their own language and culture. They grew corn but they never gave up hunting, fishing, and gathering or became as dependent on farming as the Mississippians. Consequently their population never reached Mississippian proportions, nor did they get involved in warfare to the point where everyone had to live in fortified villages.
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