diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index b7efbebc..d765363b 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,9 @@
+2011-11-14  Paul Smith  <psmith@gnu.org>
+
+	* read.c (eval): parse_file_seq() might shorten the string due to
+	backslash removal.  Start parsing again at the colon.
+	Fixes Savannah bug #33399.
+
 2011-11-13  Paul Smith  <psmith@gnu.org>
 
 	* file.c (file_timestamp_cons): Match up data types to avoid warnings.
diff --git a/read.c b/read.c
index 451f395e..c0a6fae3 100644
--- a/read.c
+++ b/read.c
@@ -1016,16 +1016,17 @@ eval (struct ebuffer *ebuf, int set_default)
               /* There's no need to be ivory-tower about this: check for
                  one of the most common bugs found in makefiles...  */
               fatal (fstart, _("missing separator%s"),
-                     (cmd_prefix == '\t' && !strneq(line, "        ", 8))
+                     (cmd_prefix == '\t' && !strneq (line, "        ", 8))
                      ? "" : _(" (did you mean TAB instead of 8 spaces?)"));
             continue;
           }
 
         /* Make the colon the end-of-string so we know where to stop
-           looking for targets.  */
+           looking for targets.  Start there again once we're done.  */
         *colonp = '\0';
         filenames = PARSE_FILE_SEQ (&p2, struct nameseq, '\0', NULL, 0);
-        *p2 = ':';
+        *colonp = ':';
+        p2 = colonp;
 
         if (!filenames)
           {
diff --git a/tests/ChangeLog b/tests/ChangeLog
index e2048ff4..e2ada201 100644
--- a/tests/ChangeLog
+++ b/tests/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,8 @@
+2011-11-14  Paul Smith  <psmith@gnu.org>
+
+	* scripts/features/double_colon: Check double-colon with escaped
+	filenames.  See Savannah bug #33399.
+
 2011-09-18  Paul Smith  <psmith@gnu.org>
 
 	* scripts/features/parallelism: On re-exec make sure we preserve
diff --git a/tests/scripts/features/double_colon b/tests/scripts/features/double_colon
index cad605db..1097775b 100644
--- a/tests/scripts/features/double_colon
+++ b/tests/scripts/features/double_colon
@@ -151,5 +151,14 @@ two');
 
 unlink('result','one','two');
 
+# TEST 10: check for proper backslash handling
+#          Savannah bug #33399
+
+run_make_test('
+a\ xb :: ; @echo one
+a\ xb :: ; @echo two
+',
+              '', "one\ntwo\n");
+
 # This tells the test driver that the perl test script executed properly.
 1;