Along El Camino Real del los Tejas
Caddo Mounds State Historic Site
The state highway between Crockett and Nacogdoches roughly follows a prehistoric trading route through Texas called El Camino Real de los Tejas by the Spanish – and where today travelers can visit a grass house constructed much like the ancient original.
In 1689, an entrada (expedition) that started in northern Mexico, led by Alonso de Léon along with Fray Damián Massanet, traveled this route. After crossing the Trinity River, the Spaniards encountered the Nabedache Caddo people, which de Léon called Tejas. They were the westernmost Caddos of the Hasinai Confederacy living on family farms scattered over the area between the Trinity River and the Neches River. Another Caddo tribe of the Hasinai, called the Neche, lived in an area extending east of the Neches River.
The Nabedache and Neche Caddo are descendants of a people who lived in this area as early as 500 AD. The prehistory of the Caddo includes an extended period when they were part of the much larger Mississippi Mound Builder culture. They were the most advanced culture in Texas beginning about 800 AD until the civilization’s collapse about 500 years later. During its height, the Caddo civilization thrived over northeast Texas, eastern Oklahoma, northwestern Louisiana and southeastern Arkansas. Caddo Mounds, on the east side of the Neches River, was the focal point of a prehistoric community that once encompassed about 90 acres and included between 900 and 1,100 people who were housed communally in as many as 150 distinctive grass houses.
Left Caddo and Kiowa storyteller and dancer Kricket Rhoads-Connywerdy (left) and daughter Angelyn. Rhoads-Connywerdy has been telling traditional Kiowa and Caddo stories since 1988. Right El Camino Real de los Tejas.
The Caddo people who comprised this pre- historic culture were mound builders, farmers and traders maintaining a trading network that extended from the West to the Southeast. The Native American thoroughfare that came to be known as El Camino Real de los Tejas was likely one of their main trade routes. Visitors to Caddo Mounds State Historic Site can walk along a short portion of the original road.
Although the Caddo people were removed in 1859 from their ancestral land to the present Caddo Nation location in Oklahoma, they come “home” to Caddo Mounds State Historic Site, which is still considered sacred by many. In the on-site museum, Texas Historical Commission staff have developed exhibits carefully designed to tell their story, including an introductory video. Short interpretive trails allow visitors to view the Ceremonial Mound and the Burial Mound. The High Temple Mound is clearly visible immediately across SH 21. The newest addition to the interpretive plan for the site — and part of the tour — is the recently constructed Grass House replica, built under the guidance of Phil Cross, a Caddo tribal member who served as advisor and construction supervisor.
