diff --git a/bootstrap.conf b/bootstrap.conf
index 6498aba5020647d72ce6d2359018ef99f680a9a3..a291590293b07a372f22c2188509b29e67f0ad47 100644
--- a/bootstrap.conf
+++ b/bootstrap.conf
@@ -181,6 +181,12 @@ ACLOCAL="$ACLOCAL -I m4"
 export ACLOCAL
 
 # Build prerequisites
+# Note that some of these programs are only required for 'make dist' to
+# succeed from a fresh git checkout; not all of these programs are
+# required to run 'make dist' on a tarball.  As a special case, we want
+# to require the equivalent of the Fedora python-devel package, but
+# RHEL 5 lacks the witness python-config package; we hack around that
+# old environment below.
 buildreq="\
 autoconf   2.59
 automake   1.9.6
@@ -191,9 +197,18 @@ gzip       -
 libtool    -
 perl       5.5
 pkg-config -
+python-config -
 rpcgen     -
 tar        -
+xmllint	   -
+xsltproc   -
 "
+# You don't have to be on a system with rpm; rather, if you happen to
+# be on RHEL 5, then this bypasses the bootstrap logic that probes for
+# a working 'python-config --version'.
+if `(rpm -q python-devel) >/dev/null 2>&1`; then
+  PYTHON_CONFIG=true
+fi
 
 # Automake requires that ChangeLog exist.
 touch ChangeLog || exit 1