diff --git a/doc/geany.txt b/doc/geany.txt
index 609f4c7b31..31c37f7f4f 100644
--- a/doc/geany.txt
+++ b/doc/geany.txt
@@ -511,12 +511,18 @@ shortcuts including for Most-Recently-Used document switching.
 
 Cloning documents
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
 The `Document->Clone` menu item copies the current document's text,
 cursor position and properties into a new untitled document. If
 there is a selection, only the selected text is copied. This can be
 useful when making temporary copies of text or for creating
 documents with similar or identical contents.
 
+The new document gets a filename based on the original document, and is 
+in the form of '<original_name>.copy-xx' where 'xx' is a number ranging 
+from 00 to 99.  The name that doesn't point to an existing file and is 
+not used by any document gets used.
+
 
 Character sets and Unicode Byte-Order-Mark (BOM)
 ------------------------------------------------
diff --git a/src/document.c b/src/document.c
index e144cc1d10..41e145ad84 100644
--- a/src/document.c
+++ b/src/document.c
@@ -3326,7 +3326,7 @@ GeanyDocument *document_index(gint idx)
 
 GeanyDocument *document_clone(GeanyDocument *old_doc)
 {
-	gchar *text;
+	gchar *text, *new_filename = NULL;
 	GeanyDocument *doc;
 	ScintillaObject *old_sci;
 
@@ -3337,7 +3337,44 @@ GeanyDocument *document_clone(GeanyDocument *old_doc)
 	else
 		text = sci_get_contents(old_sci, -1);
 
-	doc = document_new_file(NULL, old_doc->file_type, text);
+	/* create a new filename based on the old filename */
+	if (old_doc->file_name)
+	{
+		guint i, j;
+
+		for (i = 0; i <= 99; ++i)
+		{
+			gchar *candidate = g_strdup_printf("%s.copy-%02u", old_doc->file_name, i);
+			gboolean unused = TRUE;
+
+			foreach_document(j)
+			{
+				if (documents[j]->file_name && strcmp(documents[j]->file_name, candidate) == 0)
+				{
+					unused = FALSE;
+					break;
+				}
+			}
+
+			if (unused)
+			{
+				gchar *locale_candidate = utils_get_locale_from_utf8(candidate);
+				gboolean file_exists = g_file_test(locale_candidate, G_FILE_TEST_EXISTS);
+				g_free(locale_candidate);
+
+				if (!file_exists)
+				{
+					new_filename = candidate;
+					break;
+				}
+			}
+
+			g_free(candidate);
+		}
+	}
+
+	doc = document_new_file(new_filename, old_doc->file_type, text);
+	g_free(new_filename);
 	g_free(text);
 	document_set_text_changed(doc, TRUE);