This essay reconsiders the circumstances surrounding Captain-Engineer J.W.B. Wardenaar’s October 1815 survey of the Majapahit court-city at Trowulan and its subsequent disappearance from scholarly view for nearly two centuries. Drawing upon recently recovered documentation, including Wardenaar’s map and legend now held in the British Museum, the chapter explores why this remarkably accurate survey—produced under difficult field conditions and with limited instruments—failed to attract the attention of Thomas Stamford Raffles and later colonial scholars. The discussion raises a series of fundamental questions regarding the nature of Majapahit’s polity, its material remains, its contested legacy in the centuries following its decline, and the role of early colonial administrators, antiquarians, and archaeologists (both professionals and amateurs) in shaping the modern understanding of the site. The essay argues that personal agendas, administrative rivalries, and the politics of knowledge production have long obstructed objective study of Trowulan, resulting in misconceptions, destructive commercial practices, and a persistent reluctance to acknowledge indigenous and foreign scholarly contributions alike. By revisiting the forgotten history of Wardenaar’s efforts and the subsequent archival, archaeological, and political entanglements that shaped the fate of Majapahit studies in the next two centuries, the chapter calls for greater transparency, open access to historical materials, and a renewed engagement with both textual and material evidence in order to move beyond the ‘solipsistic nationalist shell’ that has limited the field.