The period after 800 AD can be seen as a period of transition in which status differentiation and hierarchically ranked society evolved, which can be identified by a shift from achieved to ascribed leadership. After about 1200 AD this process was interrupted by the absorption of many Caribbean Islands into the socio-political structure of the Greater Antillean society. This process disrupted more-or-less independent lines of development of local communities and marked the beginnings of sociopolitical changes on a much larger scale.