diff --git a/release/doc/Makefile b/release/doc/Makefile
index 51076c21309a..787ec93ecbdf 100644
--- a/release/doc/Makefile
+++ b/release/doc/Makefile
@@ -3,12 +3,12 @@
 # The user can override the default language to build and install
 # with the RELNOTES_LANG variable.
 # 
-SUBDIR =	share/sgml
 .if defined(RELNOTES_LANG) && !empty(RELNOTES_LANG)
 SUBDIR+= 	${RELNOTES_LANG}
 .else
 SUBDIR+=	en_US.ISO8859-1
 .endif
+SUBDIR+=	share/sgml
 
 RELN_ROOT?= ${.CURDIR}