ABSTRACT
In Wichmann (1995: ch. 9.3) I offer a critique of Campbell and Kaufillan (1976), an article which seeks to identifY a direction and to fix a historical time-depth for a large number of loanwords in Meso-America. In all cases the donor is said to be Proto-Mixe-Zoquean and the historical setting is seen as a cultural domination exerted by the archaeological Olmec over the rest of Meso-America. These loanwords are treated en bloc as an argument for linking the Olmec up to an early form of Mixe-Zoquean. My critique consisted in pointing out, for a number of the individual putative donor items that their attestations in Mixe-Zoquean languages are not such that the assumed time-depth of about 3,500 years can be sustained.
