Abstract: A method for treating rare earth permanent magnetic material is disclosed. The treatment includes soaking ribbon rare earth permanent magnetic material consisting essentially of grains of the tetragonal crystal phase RE.sub.2 TM.sub.14 B where RE is neodymium and/or praseodymium or mixtures thereof with other rare earth elements and TM is iron or mixtures of iron and cobalt, cobalt in a soaking solution of either distilled water or phosphoric acid and manganese phosphate solution, draining off the soaking solution, rinsing with distilled water while agitating to separate and remove fine powdered magnetic material, and washing and drying the remaining powder or ribbons. The treated material is taken to substantial dryness before the material is incorporated into a permanent magnet.