Oto-Pamean as diaspora

Oto-Pamean languages cluster north of The Vale Now Of The Mexica. At least two of such tribes, Pame and Jonaz, are Dog Peoples - "Chichimec" nomads of the north. Otomí tradition has it that they came from the north as well. The Nahua, likewise, are famously intruders from the north. Almost all Native Americans came from the north of course but it is unlikely that as of 1500 AD they remembered as far back as Clovis.

To be remembered: Sometimes They Come Back. The Huastec had drifted north from the Maya lands.

So we may question if the Pame (or the proto-Otomí) are originally of El Norte, as were the Nahua.

Oto-Pamean happens to reside within a larger family, Oto-Manguean, which clusters south. Actually very FAR south; the Tlapanec branch once had colonies in Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Those paraTlapanec outposts don't seem ever to have been very prominent and they have all died out now. The Mixtec / Zapotec branch, in west/east Oaxaca, has done rather better.

I wonder if the Mixtec and/or Zapotec had - at some point - attacked the Tlapanec and forced many northward.