Because of the destruction of cathedral treasuries during the French

Question

Because of the destruction of  cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces find  their way to France.

A. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces find
B. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces had found
C. treasuries belonging to cathedrals during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces had found
D. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces are finding
E. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces found

Source: Master GMAT

THIS IS A POOR QUALITY QUESTION.

THE TOPIC IS LOCKED.

ConnectTheDots · Accepted Answer

I also choose E. But seems B is correct.

If the Past Perfect action did occur at a specific time, the Simple Past can be used instead of the Past Perfect when "before" or "after" is used in the sentence. The words "before" and "after" actually tell you what happens first, so the Past Perfect is optional. For this reason, both sentences below are correct.

Examples:

She had visited her Japanese relatives once in 1993 before she moved in with them in 1996.
She visited her Japanese relatives once in 1993 before she moved in with them in 1996.

If the Past Perfect is not referring to an action at a specific time, Past Perfect is not optional. Compare the examples below. Here Past Perfect is referring to a lack of experience rather than an action at a specific time. For this reason, Simple Past cannot be used.

Examples:

She never saw a bear before she moved to Alaska. Not Correct
She had never seen a bear before she moved to Alaska. Correct

https://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/pastperfect.html

KarishmaB · Answer

Responding to a pm:

Usually, when the sequence is specified with 'before', 'after' etc, past perfect is not required so just 'found' is acceptable. Also, use of 'had found' along with a sequence specifier is not incorrect. 
One event happened before - most pieces found their way to France
The other happened later - works of Art became scarce
So 'had found' is correct but so in 'after ... found'

The difference between (B) and (E) is a matter of preference and too subtle to be tested without another error in one of the choices.

SOURH7WK · Answer

I will say this question as a debatable one. I picked option E. There is a minor difference between B & E

B. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce  after  the majority of the pieces  had  found
E. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce  after  the majority of the pieces found

When there is a time marker (before/after etc) then the usage of perfect tense becomes optional. So I think grammatically option B and E are both correct. Here also i will prefer E coz it is shorter than B.

saikarthikreddy · Answer

I think between B and E,E must be the answer. The right meaning is conveyed only in option E.The art became scarce only after most of the treasuries were destroyed and then most of the art works were moved to France in order to compensate for the loss.Hence the transfer of art took place only after the destruction .Hence the use of past perfect leads to an error in option B.

aks456 · Answer

IMO B
in this question two actions are there..i .e after destruction firstly the majority of pieces found their went to france and later works of aanglo-saxon art became scarce..whenever two actions are taking place at different times... the action that occurs first is in past perfect tense and the action that occurs after it is in past tense... this is true only for B where first action i.e " the majority of the pieces  had found " is in past perfect tense and the action that occurs later is in past tense i.e "works of Anglo-Saxon art  became scarce "

gwu · Answer

I agree with SOURH7WK. Why use the perfect tense when there is already a timer marker

What is the OE

aks456 · Answer

If the events occur at a specified time then past perfect is optional..but incase no specific time is mentioned then use of past perfect is mandatory.

mohnish104 · Answer

The use of 'had' is justified. The work of arts became scarce 'after' the majority of the pieces found their way. I was confused between B and C.

gwu · Answer

why should we use the past perfect when we already have the logic conveyed in the sentence

E.g X's became scarce AFTER Y's found their way into France.

X happened "after" Y . Logic in sequence already conveyed by AFTER

idinuv · Answer

Request the experts to provide their input.

TGC · Answer

Let us understand the sentence,

Because of X blah blah blah, Y happened after Z

A. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces  find  (Incorrect verb tense)
B. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces  had found 
 (When two events are stated in past the older event uses past perfect tense of the form HAD+Verbed, but when you mention the word after there is no way past perfect is required. However, at times GMAT prefers Past perfect in these circumstances.
C.  treasuries belonging to cathedrals  during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces had found
Clearly matter of concision
D. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the  pieces are finding 
Wrong tense
E. cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce  after  the majority of the pieces  found 
This seems to be correct since when you mention the word 'after' then past tense will do.

On the other hand , I will go with (E) as far as concision is concerned since clearly when past tense would do there is no need to use past perfect which makes the sentence wordy.

Rgds,
TGC!

samusa · Answer

Both B and E convey the same meaning.

Both are correct.

alpham · Answer

this type of question is really just to screw with you. From my experience, including the past perfect tends to be the correct answer with these type of time marker tense questions. Unsure if this is the case with the real test (most likely not tested)

avinsethi · Answer

Why can't the answer be {E} ?

Because of the destruction of  cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces find  their way to France.

cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces find
 
cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces had found
 
treasuries belonging to cathedrals during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces had found
 
cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces are finding
 
cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces found

broall · Answer

This question seems to be poor quality. You don't need to waste time on it.

WiziusCareers1 · Answer

Because of the destruction of  cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces find  their way to France.

(A) cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces find
 
(B) cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces had found

(C) treasuries belonging to cathedrals during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces had found

(D) cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces are finding

(E) cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces found

chetan2u · Answer

A poor quality question. 
B and E both are correct, although E is slightly better as HAD is not required as the sequence is already conveyed by AFTER. But real GMAT will never test on such a subtle difference. There will be some other errors to differentiate between the two.

Archit3110 · Answer

wiziuscareers quoting your signature: https://www.wizius.in Better Prep. Better Scores. Better Schools Guaranteed Admission to Top-50 MBA Programs You either get-in or get your money-back. is it a scheme or a guarantee?

aanchals · Answer

Because of the destruction of cathedral treasuries during the French revolution, works of Anglo-Saxon art became scarce after the majority of the pieces find their way to France.

this is the question. I know its a poor question, but ignoring that, can you tell me how to choose between cathedral treasuries and treasuries of cathedrals? 
Even in general when do we choose what?

Because of the destruction of cathedral treasuries during the French

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

Because of the destruction of cathedral treasuries during the French

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