Although the importance of the northwest Gulf coastal region in the problem of Mexican-Southeastern relationships frequently has been pointed out, the region has received comparatively little archaeological investigation. As a relatively uniform and unbroken territory, stretching from the Caddo area on the east to the Huastec area on the south, the region forms one of the most likely routes of land communication between the advanced cultures of Mexico and those of the Southeast. Inhabited at the time of the Conquest by numerous bands of nomadic hunters, fishermen, and food-gatherers who left nothing comparable with the spectacular remains of their neighbors to the east and south, the region generally has been neglected in favor of richer fields.