The upper Neches River Basin in the Pineywoods and Post Oak Savannah of East Texas is one part of the southern Caddo area where populations of ancestral Caddo groups were notably higher during the Late Caddo period, ca. A.D. 1400-1680, than at other times over their ca. 1000 year settlement of the region. The Frankston phase is comprised of farmsteads, hamlets, and small villages in the Neches and Angelina river basins in East Texas. Other Frankston phase sites are represented by small residential settlements in dispersed agricultural communities, with small family and/or community cemeteries not used for long periods of time, such as at the Lang Pasture site (41AN38). Concentrations of Frankston phase sites in the upper Neches River basin seem to comprise base settlement clusters with middens, burials, and house structures, likely representing permanent settlements on streamside flats with fertile soils in the uplands. Other site types include scattered sherds, which perhaps are gathering stations in which pitted stones are found with a few sherds, and small campsites. The ceramic vessel sherds from three Frankston phase settlements in the upper Neches River basin are the subject of this article
