Caddo

Caddo (kăd`ō), Native North Americans whose language belongs to the Caddoan branch of the Hokan-Siouan linguistic stock (see Native American languages). These people gave their name not only to the linguistic branch but also to the Caddo confederacy, a loose federation of tribes that in prehistoric times occupied lands from the Red River valley in Louisiana to the Brazos River valley in Texas and N into Arkansas and Kansas. Members, besides the Caddo, included the Arikara, the Pawnee, the Wichita, and others. The culture of these loosely knit peoples was similar. Generally they were sedentary, living in villages of conical huts, although they did raise horses. The culture of the Caddo proper was marked by a clearly defined system of social stratification and by a religion that closely regulated daily life. Some now reside on tribal land in Oklahoma. In 1990 there were 3,000 Caddo in the United States.

Bibliography

See J. T. Hughes, Prehistory of the Caddoan-Speaking Tribes (1968).

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Caddo

Incised redware cat effigy bowl, Caddoan from Louisiana; in the National Museum of the American …

(credit: Courtesy of the National Museum of the American Indian, New York City)

One of a group of North American Indian people living mostly in western Oklahoma, U.S. Their language is of the Caddoan linguistic family. Their name derives from a French truncation of kadohadacho, meaning “real chief” in Caddo. From ancient times they occupied the lower Red River area in Louisiana and Arkansas, and many striking examples of prehistoric pottery and basketry have been found. They were a semisedentary agricultural people who lived in conical pole-and-thatch dwellings. In the 18th century, pressures from white settlers pushed many Caddo off their lands, a process that intensified with the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. By 1835 the Caddo had ceded all their land to the U.S., and by 1859 most were living on reservations in Oklahoma. Caddo descendants numbered more than 4,000 in the early 21st century.