 Sapper's contributions to the study of Mesoamerican languages include his initial proposal, made in a 1912 paper, which surmised that the highland regions of Chiapas and Guatemala was the location from which the Mayan languages and the Maya peoples later diversified.The assessment of a number of modern linguists places the likely home of the Proto-Mayan language as being centered on the Cuchumatanes highlands of Guatemala, with a subsequent early occupancy of the Chiapas highlands proper.Sapper is commemorated in the scientific names of two Central American snakes