Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:01:32.307Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Evidences of Pre-Pottery Cultures in Louisiana

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2017

C. H. Webb*
Affiliation:
Shreveport, La.

Extract

Studies of Louisiana's prehistory have been devoted largely to the pottery-making and mound-building cultures. The topography of the state is primarily responsible for this fact, since the delta lands of southern Louisiana and the wide, fertile river valleys of the northern part were particularly suitable for the agricultural peoples whose numerous sites have attracted attention. Witness to this fact is the long sequence of pottery-containing cultures (Tchefuncte, Marksville, Troyville, Coles Creek, Plaquemine, historic Natchez) delineated by Ford, Willey, and Quimby in central and southern Louisiana, while the Red and Ouachita River valleys in the northern portion present another series of culture periods (Marksville, Coles Creek, Gahagan, Bossier, Belcher, Glendora) which culminate in the historic Caddo.

Despite these facts, evidences of pre-pottery cultures are appearing in the state and these may be expected to increase as more careful investigations are pursued. This could be anticipated from the situation in surrounding states—the Edwards Plateau culture of central Texas, the Ozark Bluff Dweller culture of Arkansas and the several strata which underlie the pottery containing cultures in the Southeast, recently reviewed by Haag.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1948

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Collins, Henry B. Jr. 1941. “Relationships of an Early Indian Cranial Series from Louisiana.Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences, Vol. 31, No. 4. Washington.Google Scholar
Dellinger, S. C., and Dickinson, S. D. 1942. “Pottery from the Ozark Bluff Shelters.AMERICAN ANTIQUITY, Vol. 7, No. 3, pp. 27689.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ford, J. A., and Quimby, G. I. 1945. “The Tchefuncte Culture, an Early Occupation of the Lower Mississippi Valley.” MEMOIRS OF THE SOCIETY FOR AMERICAN ARCHAEOLOGY, No. 2.Google Scholar
Ford, J. A., and Welley, Gordon 1940. “An Interpretation of the Prehistory of the Eastern United States.American Anthropologist, N.S., Vol. 43, No. 3, pp. 325-63. Menasha.Google Scholar
Griffin, James B. 1946. “Cultural Change and Continuity in Eastern United States Archaeology.” In “Man in Northeastern North America.” Papers of the Robert S. Peabody Foundation for Archaeology, Vol. 3, pp. 3795. Andover, Mass.Google Scholar
Haag, William G. 1942. “Early Horizons in the Southeast.AMERICAN ANTIQUITY, Vol. 7, No. 3, pp. 209-22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howard, E. B. 1943. “The Finley Site: Discovery of Yuma Points, in situ, near Eden, Wyoming.AMERICAN ANTIQUITY, Vol. 8, No. 3, pp. 224-34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, W. B. 1939. “Geology of the Tennessee Valley Region of Alabama.” In Webb, W. S., “An Archaeological Survey of the Wheeler Basin on the Tennessee River in Northern Alabama.Bulletin, Bureau of American Ethnology, No. 122, pp. 920.Google Scholar
Krieger, A. D. 1947. “The Eastward Extension of Puebloan Datings toward Cultures of the Mississippi Valley.” AMERICAN ANTIQUITY, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp. 141-8. CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martin, Paul S.; Quimby, George I.; and Collier, Donald 1947. Indians Before Columbus. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Moore, C. B. 1913. “Some Aboriginal Sites in Louisiana and Arkansas.Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, N.S., Vol. 16, Pt. 1. Philadelphia.Google Scholar
Ritchie, William A. 1938. “A Perspective of Northeastern Archaeology.” AMERICAN ANTIQUITY, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 94112.Google Scholar
Sayles, E. B. 1935. “An Archaeological Survey of Texas.” Medallion Papers, No. 17. Globe, Arizona.Google Scholar
Stirling, Matthew 1943. “On the Folsom Finds.El Norte de Mexico y el Sur de los Estados Unidos, p. 165. Mexico: Sociedad Mexicana de Antropologia.Google Scholar
Walker, W. M. 1935. “A Caddo Burial Site at Natchitoches, Louisiana.Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 94, No. 14. Washington.Google Scholar
Webb, C. H. 1944. “Stone Vessels from a Northeast Louisiana Site.AMERICAN ANTIQUITY, Vol. 9, No. 4, pp. 386-94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Webb, C. H. 1945. “A Second Historic Caddo Site at Natchitoches, Louisiana.Bulletin of the Texas Archaeological and Paleontological Society, Vol. 16. Abilene.Google Scholar
Webb, C. H. 1946. “Two Unusual Types of Chipped Stone Artifact from Northwest Louisiana.Bulletin of the Texas Archaeological and Paleontological Society, Vol. 17. Abilene.Google Scholar
Webb, C. H., and Monroe, Dodd 1939. “Further Excavations of the Gahagan Mound.” Bulletin of the Texas Archaeological and Paleontological Society, Vol. 11. Abilene.Google Scholar
Webb, W. S., and Dejarnette, D. L. 1942. “An Archeological Survey of the Pickwick Basin in the Adjacent Portions of the States of Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee.” Bulletin, Bureau of American Ethnology, No. 129. Washington.Google Scholar