diff --git a/src/interfaces/ecpg/preproc/extern.h b/src/interfaces/ecpg/preproc/extern.h
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..e9f5d8fb14
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/interfaces/ecpg/preproc/extern.h
@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+/* variables */
+
+extern int debugging, braces_open;
+extern char * yytext;
+extern int yylineno, yyleng;
+extern FILE *yyin, *yyout;
+
+
+/* functions */
+
+extern void lex_init(void);
+extern char * input_filename;
+extern int yyparse(void);