diff --git a/bfd/ChangeLog b/bfd/ChangeLog
index 134f41d53e9..640ec8d621c 100644
--- a/bfd/ChangeLog
+++ b/bfd/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,7 @@
+1999-10-15  Andrew Haley  <aph@cygnus.com>
+
+	* dwarf1.c (parse_die): Fail to parse a die if its length is zero.
+
 Sun Oct 17 17:19:00 1999  Jeffrey A Law  (law@cygnus.com)
 
 	* libhppa.h (bfd_hppa_insn2fmt): Change to return an int.
diff --git a/bfd/dwarf1.c b/bfd/dwarf1.c
index 903bfc38ab5..da184cc7058 100644
--- a/bfd/dwarf1.c
+++ b/bfd/dwarf1.c
@@ -186,6 +186,8 @@ parse_die (abfd, aDieInfo, aDiePtr)
   /* First comes the length. */
   aDieInfo->length = bfd_get_32 (abfd, xptr);
   xptr += 4;
+  if (aDieInfo->length == 0)
+    return false;
   if (aDieInfo->length < 6)
     {
       /* Just padding bytes. */