Stacey/Ron:Doubt on Usage of Past Perfect

[himanshu.barik.86]

Hi Stacey/Ron,
I came across the following question while watching a youtube video of an expert from master gmat and am confused with the explanation provided by him.Please help.

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 (had found/found) their way to France.

The doubt is in the usage of the correct tense in the bracketed part.

I had studied in the MGMAT SC guide that the usage of words like "before" and "after" indicate the sequence of events clearly and make the use of PAST PERFECT unnecessary. So,I chose "found".But the expert seemed to ignore this fact and chose "had found".

Please help.

[RonPurewal]

first, this is the wrong folder for this question -- this folder is supposed to be for problems from the gmat prep software. however, since there are going to be no more posts on this thread (see below), i'll let it stand.

--

when it comes to past events, if those events are presented as a simple SEQUENCE (x after y, x and then y, etc.), then it's customary just to put them in the past tense. therefore, you are right; given the surrounding context, "found" is better.
note, though, that there are other ways to write this same idea that would involve the past perfect. for instance, you would write "most of the pieces had found their way to france by the time the cathedrals were destroyed, and so were lost." note that this sentence no longer contains a simple sequence of events.

finally, i don't think the official exam is going to test a difference this subtle, anyway. this is a very writerly kind of difference; if it appears in the answer choices, rest assured that there will be some other criterion on which you can eliminate instead.