diff --git a/conf/topdir/Makefile b/conf/topdir/Makefile
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..7f6e10f5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/conf/topdir/Makefile
@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+TOPDIR = ../..
+
+CONFIG_SUBDIR = $(notdir $(shell pwd))
+
+include $(TOPDIR)/make/proj.mk
+include $(JWBDIR)/make/conf.mk
diff --git a/make/topdir.mk b/make/topdir.mk
index 9830022d..cde44114 100644
--- a/make/topdir.mk
+++ b/make/topdir.mk
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+# Need second expansion for TD_COPY_XXX concatenation rule to work
+.SECONDEXPANSION:
+
 .PHONY: \
 	FORCE \
 	all \
@@ -107,10 +110,18 @@ STREAMLINE_PROJECT          ?= bash $(JWB_SCRIPT_DIR)/streamline-project.sh
 
 INSTALLED_TOPDIR_FILES       = $(addprefix $(INSTALL_DOCDIR)/, $(DOCS))
 
+TD_CONF_DIR                 ?= $(JW_PKG_CONF_BASE_DIR)/topdir
+TD_COPY_SRC                 ?= $(TD_CONF_DIR)
+TD_COPY_FILES               ?= $(filter-out Makefile,$(notdir $(wildcard $(TD_COPY_SRC)/*)))
+# -- Internal variables, define JW_PKG_TOPDIR_COPY_PATH if you want to
+#  add more files appended to the target files
+TD_COPY_SRC_PATH             = $(subst :,$(space),$(JW_PKG_TOPDIR_COPY_PATH))
+TD_GENERATE_FILES           += $(TD_COPY_FILES)
+
 all: config
 format:
-check-syntax:
-check-format:
+check-syntax: topdir
+check-format: topdir
 check: check-syntax check-format
 install: topdir.install
 clean: topdir.clean
@@ -129,10 +140,13 @@ local-%: FORCE
 unlocal:
 	$(RM) -f $(shell find . -name local.mk)
 
+topdir: $(TD_GENERATE_FILES)
+topdir.clean:
+	$(RM) -rf *.done $(TD_GENERATE_FILES)
+clean: topdir.clean
 topdir.distclean: topdir.clean
 	$(RM) -rf dist *.dist
-topdir.clean:
-	$(RM) -rf *.done
+distclean: topdir.distclean
 topdir.mrproper: topdir.distclean
 	find . -name '*.rep' | xargs -r $(RM) -f
 
@@ -282,3 +296,9 @@ recache-vars:
 
 canonicalize-remotes:
 	$(PYTHON) $(JWB_SCRIPT_DIR)/jw-pkg.py projects canonicalize-remotes
+
+Makefile: ;
+
+%: $(TD_COPY_SRC)/% $$(foreach path,$$(TD_COPY_SRC_PATH),$$(wildcard $$(addprefix $$(path)/,$$@))) $$(wildcard $$@.*)
+	cat $^ > $@.tmp
+	mv $@.tmp $@