diff --git a/doc/Makefile.am b/doc/Makefile.am
index 7a9fc6db..59ddb02f 100644
--- a/doc/Makefile.am
+++ b/doc/Makefile.am
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@ CONF_DBLATEX_MAN  = $(top_srcdir)/doc/conf-dblatex-man.xsl
 CONF_DBLATEX_PDF  = $(top_srcdir)/doc/conf-dblatex-pdf.xsl
 TWEAK_DBLATEX_PDF = $(top_srcdir)/doc/tweak-dblatex-pdf.xsl
 TWEAK_DB_ARTICLE  = $(top_srcdir)/doc/tweak-db-article.xsl
+TWEAK_DB_REFENTRY = $(top_srcdir)/doc/tweak-db-refentry.xsl
 
 DB_VARS = man.endnotes.list.enabled=0 man.endnotes.are.numbered=0 man.authors.section.enabled=0
 
@@ -32,17 +33,18 @@ dvi-pdf: dvisvgm.dvi
 dvisvgm.dvi: dvisvgm.1
 	groff -Tdvi -mandoc ./$< >$@
 
-dvisvgm.html: dvisvgm-man.xml
+dvisvgm.html: dvisvgm-man.xml db2html.xsl
 	xsltproc -o $@ db2html.xsl $<
 
 dvisvgm.epub: dvisvgm-article.xml
 	a2x -darticle -fepub -L --icons --icons-dir=. $<
 	mv $(basename $<).epub $@
 
-dvisvgm-man.xml: dvisvgm.txt
+dvisvgm-man.xml: dvisvgm.txt $(TWEAK_DB_REFENTRY)
 	if [ `type -p asciidoc` ]; then \
-		asciidoc -a icons -a 'iconsdir=.' -a badges -a 'revnumber=@VERSION@' --unsafe -bdocbook -dmanpage -o $@ $<; \
-		sed -i "s#\(</refmeta>\)#<refmiscinfo class='date'>$(shell stat -c %y $<)</refmiscinfo>\n\1#" $@; \
+		asciidoc -a icons -a 'iconsdir=.' -a badges -a 'revnumber=@VERSION@' --unsafe -bdocbook -dmanpage -o $@.tmp $<; \
+		xsltproc -o $@ $(TWEAK_DB_REFENTRY) $@.tmp; \
+		rm $@.tmp; \
 	fi
 
 dvisvgm-article.xml: dvisvgm.txt
diff --git a/doc/db2html.xsl b/doc/db2html.xsl
index 4d69459b..b8799138 100644
--- a/doc/db2html.xsl
+++ b/doc/db2html.xsl
@@ -31,7 +31,7 @@
 					<div class="col-md-6">
 						<span class="pull-right" style="padding-bottom:1em">
 							<xsl:text>Last updated: </xsl:text>
-							<xsl:value-of select="substring-before(*/refmeta/refmiscinfo[@class='date'], ' ')"/>
+							<xsl:value-of select="*/refmeta/refmiscinfo[@class='date']"/>
 						</span>
 					</div>
 				</div>
diff --git a/doc/tweak-db-refentry.xsl b/doc/tweak-db-refentry.xsl
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..f7fbcb76
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doc/tweak-db-refentry.xsl
@@ -0,0 +1,30 @@
+<?xml version="1.0"?>
+<!-- This file is part of dvisvgm -->
+<!-- Copyright (C) 2015-2017 Martin Gieseking <martin.gieseking@uos.de> -->
+<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
+	xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
+	xmlns:date="http://exslt.org/dates-and-times"
+	extension-element-prefixes="date">
+
+	<xsl:output doctype-public="-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN" doctype-system="http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.5/docbookx.dtd"/>
+
+	<!-- add date to refmeta element -->
+	<xsl:template match="refmeta">
+		<xsl:copy>
+			<xsl:copy-of select="*"/>
+			<xsl:variable name="date" select="date:date()"/>
+			<xsl:if test="$date">
+				<refmiscinfo class="date">
+					<xsl:value-of select="substring($date, 1, 10)"/>
+				</refmiscinfo>
+			</xsl:if>
+		</xsl:copy>
+	</xsl:template>
+
+	<!-- copy everything else unchanged -->
+	<xsl:template match="@*|node()">
+		<xsl:copy>
+			<xsl:apply-templates select="@*|node()"/>
+		</xsl:copy>
+	</xsl:template>
+</xsl:stylesheet>