diff --git a/modules/imgproc/src/drawing.cpp b/modules/imgproc/src/drawing.cpp
index 27411b247a..e52312a3b8 100644
--- a/modules/imgproc/src/drawing.cpp
+++ b/modules/imgproc/src/drawing.cpp
@@ -2229,7 +2229,10 @@ void cv::polylines(InputOutputArray _img, InputArrayOfArrays pts,
     {
         Mat p = pts.getMat(manyContours ? i : -1);
         if( p.total() == 0 )
+        {
+            npts[i] = 0;
             continue;
+        }
         CV_Assert(p.checkVector(2, CV_32S) >= 0);
         ptsptr[i] = p.ptr<Point>();
         npts[i] = p.rows*p.cols*p.channels()/2;
diff --git a/modules/imgproc/test/test_contours.cpp b/modules/imgproc/test/test_contours.cpp
index 6c5c3f0ebb..b0b8c4fbb5 100644
--- a/modules/imgproc/test/test_contours.cpp
+++ b/modules/imgproc/test/test_contours.cpp
@@ -410,4 +410,23 @@ TEST(Core_Drawing, _914)
     ASSERT_EQ( (3*rows + cols)*3 - 3*9, pixelsDrawn);
 }
 
+TEST(Core_Drawing, polylines_empty)
+{
+    Mat img(100, 100, CV_8UC1, Scalar(0));
+    vector<Point> pts; // empty
+    polylines(img, pts, false, Scalar(255));
+    int cnt = countNonZero(img);
+    ASSERT_EQ(cnt, 0);
+}
+
+TEST(Core_Drawing, polylines)
+{
+    Mat img(100, 100, CV_8UC1, Scalar(0));
+    vector<Point> pts;
+    pts.push_back(Point(0, 0));
+    pts.push_back(Point(20, 0));
+    polylines(img, pts, false, Scalar(255));
+    int cnt = countNonZero(img);
+    ASSERT_EQ(cnt, 21);
+}
 /* End of file. */