diff --git a/lib/tokenize.cpp b/lib/tokenize.cpp
index 6bc179efa..7fc0ac63c 100644
--- a/lib/tokenize.cpp
+++ b/lib/tokenize.cpp
@@ -8921,11 +8921,12 @@ void Tokenizer::simplifyComparisonOrder()
 void Tokenizer::simplifyConst()
 {
     for (Token *tok = _tokens; tok; tok = tok->next()) {
-        if (Token::Match(tok, "[;{}(,] %type% const") &&
-            tok->next()->str().find(":") == std::string::npos &&
-            tok->next()->str() != "operator") {
-            tok->tokAt(2)->str(tok->next()->str());
-            tok->next()->str("const");
+        if (Token::Match(tok, "%type% const") &&
+            (!tok->previous() || Token::Match(tok->previous(), "[;{}(,]")) &&
+            tok->str().find(":") == std::string::npos &&
+            tok->str() != "operator") {
+            tok->next()->str(tok->str());
+            tok->str("const");
         }
     }
 }
diff --git a/test/testtokenize.cpp b/test/testtokenize.cpp
index edb373ab4..f4d57395c 100644
--- a/test/testtokenize.cpp
+++ b/test/testtokenize.cpp
@@ -4196,7 +4196,7 @@ private:
             "a = SZ;\n"
             "}\n";
         const char expected[] =
-            "static const char str [ 5 ] = \"abcd\" ;\n\nvoid f ( ) {\na = 5 ;\n}";
+            "const static char str [ 5 ] = \"abcd\" ;\n\nvoid f ( ) {\na = 5 ;\n}";
         ASSERT_EQUALS(expected, tokenizeAndStringify(code,true));
     }
 
@@ -4890,6 +4890,7 @@ private:
         ASSERT_EQUALS("void foo ( ) { int * const x ; }",
                       tokenizeAndStringify("void foo(){ int * const x;}"));
 
+        ASSERT_EQUALS("const int foo ( ) ;", tokenizeAndStringify("int const foo ();"));
     }
 
     void switchCase() {