diff --git a/tools/make-man-index.py b/tools/make-man-index.py
index 4d206ca0b6..37c708d81d 100755
--- a/tools/make-man-index.py
+++ b/tools/make-man-index.py
@@ -55,7 +55,8 @@ def make_index(pages):
         check_id(p, t)
         section = t.find('./refmeta/manvolnum').text
         refname = t.find('./refnamediv/refname').text
-        purpose = ' '.join(t.find('./refnamediv/refpurpose').text.split())
+        purpose_text = ' '.join(t.find('./refnamediv/refpurpose').itertext())
+        purpose = ' '.join(purpose_text.split())
         for f in t.findall('./refnamediv/refname'):
             infos = (f.text, section, purpose, refname)
             index[f.text[0].upper()].append(infos)