in 1885, of the Archaeological Society of Jogjakarta, which undertook the excavation of the parts of the Loro Jonggrang group covered with debris and vegetation, and the clearing of the whole, did little to ameliorate the situation with respect to the carrying away from the Prambanan temples, speaking collectively, of stones for the building of houses, factories, etc., and of ornament for the decoration of private grounds and gardens. Though bills were posted all over the ruins, including Doorga’s, alias Loro Jonggrang’s sanctum, prohibiting, by order of that Society, the salving of gods and goddesses with _boreh_ and the defacing of the walls with inscriptions, its members themselves dragged statues away to fill a so-called museum of their contrivance at the provincial capital, dislocating things of beauty, ranging the _disjecta membra_ on scaffoldings in a shed as crockery on the shelves of a cupboard. The monuments of Prambanan being primarily mausolea, their first concern was to dig for the _saptaratna_, the seven treasures buried with the ashes of the dead under the images of the deities hallowing those perishable remains. The plunder consisted in urns containing, besides the ashes, coins, rubies and other precious stones, pieces of gold- and silver-leaf with cut figures (serpents, tortoises, flowers), strips of gold-foil inscribed with ancient characters, fragments of copper and glass, etc. The mortuary pits easiest to rifle, had already been emptied before the semi-official spoilers turned their attention to them. This chapter is not the most glorious in the history of the Archaeological Society of Jogjakarta which, on the other hand, started a work too long neglected by the Dutch Government, even after Raffles’ vigorous initial effort. Incidentally it promoted the schemes of the superficial yet very ambitious, pushing to the front on the strength of what should have been put to the credit of more capable but, to their detriment, more modest labourers in the archaeological field: It is not always the most deserving horses that get the oats, says a Dutch proverb. [Illustration: VI. SIVA (LORO JONGGRANG) TEMPLE OF THE PRAMBANAN GROUP IN 1901 (Cephas Sr.)]