A bugged error message made me ruin an item instead of saving it as a crafting base

When you attempt to split an anointed amulet with catalyst quality, you get the error message "Cannot split an Item with an Enchant or Catalyst Quality.".
This is not true, items with Catalyst Quality can be split and retain both the amount and the type of Catalyst Quality on both copies.

Because I assumed the base (Focused Amulet with catalyst) could not be saved, I used a Hunter's Exalted Orb on it, which had decent chances of improving the item, but 100% chance to ruin its use as a crafting base if it fails to improve it because influence on the item prevents several other crafting methods.

While I've not tested the catalyst part, enchanted items not being able to be split sounds normal to me? And annoints are classified as enchants.

Examples: You can't split enchanted blueprints or Miraged maps for the same error message with no quality. Nothing exists on trade with both the split tag and enchanted modifier (Deli orb, Blight annoint, and Harvest enchants are applied after the split).

From my understanding now reading the Wiki, you could have removed the annoint with crafting bench. Then used a fractured fossil to split the item with quality and no enchant (probably not intended, but has been bug reported and not addressed), then do whatever you wanted to from there with your two items aside from split further.

"

This is not true, items with Catalyst Quality can be split and retain both the amount and the type of Catalyst Quality on both copies.

you sure the quality and anoint are not applied after the split?