c.

c. AD 1200 – 1500: The process of regional integration in the late pre-Columbian era eventually led to the slow absorption of smaller island societies into the sociopolitical structure of Greater Antillean polities. As the societies of Hispaniola and Puerto Rico reached their apogee, they expanded their influence both eastward into the Lesser Antilles and westward toward Cuba. This expansion disrupted long-standing, independent lines of cultural development on a regional scale, replacing them with a more centralized and dependent social order. The archaeological record shows that this integration was not a single event but a gradual transformation of social and political hierarchies. This era marks the transition from autonomous local chiefdoms to a more unified, pan-regional ideological system.