diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index c944b5cd..d35dcae0 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -2,7 +2,11 @@
 
 	* 2.1.rc1: release
 
-2009-10-19  Jay Berkenbilt  <jberkenb@argonst.com>
+2009-10-24  Jay Berkenbilt  <ejb@ql.org>
+
+	* Provide interfaces for getting qpdf's own version number
+
+2009-10-19  Jay Berkenbilt  <ejb@ql.org>
 
 	* include/qpdf/QPDF.hh (QPDF): getWarnings now returns a list of
 	QPDFExc rather than a list of strings.  This way, warnings may be
diff --git a/include/qpdf/qpdf-c.h b/include/qpdf/qpdf-c.h
index 4b000a24..698d24a7 100644
--- a/include/qpdf/qpdf-c.h
+++ b/include/qpdf/qpdf-c.h
@@ -92,6 +92,10 @@ extern "C" {
 #   define QPDF_TRUE 1
 #   define QPDF_FALSE 0
 
+    /* Returns the version of the qpdf software */
+    QPDF_DLL
+    char const* qpdf_get_qpdf_version();
+
     /* Returns dynamically allocated qpdf_data pointer; must be freed
      * by calling qpdf_cleanup.
      */
diff --git a/libqpdf/qpdf-c.cc b/libqpdf/qpdf-c.cc
index ffb8ad6f..384e0983 100644
--- a/libqpdf/qpdf-c.cc
+++ b/libqpdf/qpdf-c.cc
@@ -91,6 +91,12 @@ static QPDF_ERROR_CODE trap_errors(qpdf_data qpdf, void (*fn)(qpdf_data))
     return status;
 }
 
+char const* qpdf_get_qpdf_version()
+{
+    QTC::TC("qpdf", "qpdf-c called qpdf_get_qpdf_version");
+    return QPDF::QPDFVersion().c_str();
+}
+
 qpdf_data qpdf_init()
 {
     QTC::TC("qpdf", "qpdf-c called qpdf_init");
diff --git a/qpdf/qpdf-ctest.c b/qpdf/qpdf-ctest.c
index ef839c31..30e7af2f 100644
--- a/qpdf/qpdf-ctest.c
+++ b/qpdf/qpdf-ctest.c
@@ -292,6 +292,12 @@ int main(int argc, char* argv[])
     {
 	whoami = argv[0];
     }
+    if ((argc == 2) && (strcmp(argv[1], "--version") == 0))
+    {
+	printf("qpdf-ctest version %s\n", qpdf_get_qpdf_version());
+	return 0;
+    }
+
     if (argc < 5)
     {
 	fprintf(stderr, "usage: %s n infile password outfile\n", whoami);
diff --git a/qpdf/qpdf.testcov b/qpdf/qpdf.testcov
index 4d4c537a..54f22f1a 100644
--- a/qpdf/qpdf.testcov
+++ b/qpdf/qpdf.testcov
@@ -173,3 +173,4 @@ QPDF_encryption stream crypt filter 0
 QPDF ERR object stream with wrong type 0
 QPDF object gone after xref reconstruction 0
 qpdf-c called qpdf_has_error 0
+qpdf-c called qpdf_get_qpdf_version 0
diff --git a/qpdf/qtest/qpdf.test b/qpdf/qtest/qpdf.test
index 6a2fa5de..05e6c7ed 100644
--- a/qpdf/qtest/qpdf.test
+++ b/qpdf/qtest/qpdf.test
@@ -81,12 +81,17 @@ flush_tiff_cache();
 show_ntests();
 # ----------
 $td->notify("--- Miscellaneous Tests ---");
-$n_tests += 15;
+$n_tests += 16;
 
 $td->runtest("qpdf version",
 	     {$td->COMMAND => "qpdf --version"},
 	     {$td->REGEXP => "qpdf version \\S+\n.*", $td->EXIT_STATUS => 0},
 	     $td->NORMALIZE_NEWLINES);
+$td->runtest("C API: qpdf version",
+	     {$td->COMMAND => "qpdf-ctest --version"},
+	     {$td->REGEXP => "qpdf-ctest version \\S+\n",
+	      $td->EXIT_STATUS => 0},
+	     $td->NORMALIZE_NEWLINES);
 
 foreach (my $i = 1; $i <= 3; ++$i)
 {