diff -Nur 0ad-0.0.20-alpha/build/premake/extern_libs4.lua new/build/premake/extern_libs4.lua
--- 0ad-0.0.20-alpha/build/premake/extern_libs4.lua	2016-03-12 19:15:04.000000000 +0100
+++ new/build/premake/extern_libs4.lua	2016-08-30 16:09:37.759431993 +0200
@@ -634,7 +634,16 @@
 	},
 	tinygettext = {
 		compile_settings = function()
-			add_third_party_include_paths("tinygettext")
+			if _OPTIONS["with-system-tinygettext"] then
+				pkgconfig_cflags("tinygettext")
+			else
+				add_third_party_include_paths("tinygettext")
+			end
+		end,
+		link_settings = function()
+			if _OPTIONS["with-system-tinygettext"] then
+				pkgconfig_libs("tinygettext")
+			end
 		end,
 	},
 	valgrind = {
diff -Nur 0ad-0.0.20-alpha/build/premake/premake4.lua new/build/premake/premake4.lua
--- 0ad-0.0.20-alpha/build/premake/premake4.lua	2016-03-12 19:15:04.000000000 +0100
+++ new/build/premake/premake4.lua	2016-08-30 16:08:19.490889266 +0200
@@ -15,6 +15,7 @@
 newoption { trigger = "without-nvtt", description = "Disable use of NVTT" }
 newoption { trigger = "without-pch", description = "Disable generation and usage of precompiled headers" }
 newoption { trigger = "without-tests", description = "Disable generation of test projects" }
+newoption { trigger = "with-system-tinygettext", description = "Search standard paths for tinygettext, instead of using bundled copy" }
 
 -- OS X specific options
 newoption { trigger = "macosx-bundle", description = "Enable OSX bundle, the argument is the bundle identifier string (e.g. com.wildfiregames.0ad)" }
@@ -599,28 +600,31 @@
 	end
 	setup_static_lib_project("network", source_dirs, extern_libs, {})
 
-	source_dirs = {
-		"third_party/tinygettext/src",
-	}
-	extern_libs = {
-		"iconv",
-		"boost",
-	}
-	setup_third_party_static_lib_project("tinygettext", source_dirs, extern_libs, { } )
-	
-	-- it's an external library and we don't want to modify its source to fix warnings, so we just disable them to avoid noise in the compile output
-	if _ACTION == "vs2013" then
-		buildoptions { 
-			"/wd4127",
-			"/wd4309",
-			"/wd4800",
-			"/wd4100",
-			"/wd4996",
-			"/wd4099",
-			"/wd4503"
+	if _OPTIONS["with-system-tinygettext"] then
+		table.insert(extern_libs, "tinygettext")
+	else
+		source_dirs = {
+			"third_party/tinygettext/src",
 		}
-	end
+		extern_libs = {
+			"iconv",
+			"boost",
+		}
+		setup_third_party_static_lib_project("tinygettext", source_dirs, extern_libs, { } )
 
+		-- it's an external library and we don't want to modify its source to fix warnings, so we just disable them to avoid noise in the compile output
+		if _ACTION == "vs2013" then
+			buildoptions { 
+				"/wd4127",
+				"/wd4309",
+				"/wd4800",
+				"/wd4100",
+				"/wd4996",
+				"/wd4099",
+				"/wd4503"
+			}
+		end
+	end
 
 	if not _OPTIONS["without-lobby"] then
 		source_dirs = {