It is not dom4j which substitutes the entity references, it is the underlying xml parser.
However I noticed that you are using %errorMessage;, this notation is for a parameter-entity-reference and is only recognised in a DTD, you probably would want to use the parsed-entity-reference: &errorMessage; instead. <hibernate-mapping> <class name="ErrorMessage"> &errorMessage; </class> </hibernate-mapping> Regards, Edwin -- http://www.edankert.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by DB2 Express Download DB2 Express C - the FREE version of DB2 express and take control of your XML. No limits. Just data. Click to get it now. http://sourceforge.net/powerbar/db2/ _______________________________________________ dom4j-user mailing list dom4j-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/dom4j-user