The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 92, July 1988 - April, 1989 Page: 417

Another Look at an Eighteenth-Century
Archaeological Site in Wood County, Texas
TIMOTHY K. PERTTULA AND BOB D. SKILES *
THE FRENCH PRESENCE IN EAST TEXAS DURING THE EIGHTEENTH
century is less well known from an archaeological or archival
standpoint than is the Spanish. Although it is known that the French
maintained several trading establishments within this part of the state,
concrete evidence of these places is presently lacking. Archaeological
sites that are the material remains of these trading establishments offer
the best, and perhaps the last, remaining opportunities to understand
and assess the mutual effects of acculturation and adaptation on
French entrepreneurs and native groups such as the Caddo and Wich-
ita living in the area.
If the eighteenth-century site known as the Woldert site is the loca-
tion of the French trading post called Le Dout, the site is especially
important to future historical and scientific research dealing with Euro-
pean-Indian contact and interaction. If, on the other hand, the Wol-
dert site represents an aboriginal encampment occupied after initial
European settlement and exploration, study of the archaeological rec-
ord provides an excellent opportunity to address how Caddoan or
Wichita societies changed because of their dealings with the French and
Spanish. Whichever is the case, the Woldert locality offers rich archaeo-
logical, ethnographic, and archival evidence from which to study pro-
cesses of culture change and thereby gain a clearer and more detailed
perspective on Indian-European interaction and adaptation in eigh-
teenth-century Texas.
The Upper Sabine Basin of East Texas in the eighteenth century was
part of the area between the Upper Angelina and the Red River de-
* Timothy K. Perttula is a research scientist at the Institute of Applied Sciences, University of
North Texas. He is currently completing his Ph.D dissertation on Caddoan archaeology and
ethnohistory at the University of Washington.
Bob D. Skiles, research associate at the Institute of Applied Sciences, University of North
Texas, is a native of Wood County, Texas. He is a member of the Wood County Historical So-
ciety and the Wood County Historical Commission