The Cleveland Museum of Art said it has determined that an ancient statue in its collection, which Cambodian officials have said they believe was stolen from a heavily looted jungle temple, did not come from that location.

The museum said in a statement that a curator, Sonya Rhie Quintanilla, visited the site, about 75 miles northeast of Angkor Wat and known as Prasat Chen, this year with a mold of the statue’s base to compare it with the site. The statue depicts a kneeling monkey-headed figure, known as Hanuman.

“It was determined that there was no physical evidence to confirm it was from Prasat Chen,” the museum’s spokeswoman, Elizabeth Bolander, said in a statement. “The museum’s provenance research on the Hanuman is ongoing, and there is nothing further to add at this time.”

Prasat Chen is part of an enormous 10th-century complex of Khmer temples and other structures known as Koh Ker. Cleveland’s research effort was first reported by The Plain Dealer newspaper.

At least a dozen objects, experts say, were stolen from Prasat Chen in the 1970s during a civil war in Cambodia. Since the start of last year, five looted items from the complex that have turned up in the United States have been repatriated to Cambodia. 

> via NYT