diff --git a/maven-artifact/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersion.java b/maven-artifact/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersion.java
index 856eb13777..cf3dc95d3a 100644
--- a/maven-artifact/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersion.java
+++ b/maven-artifact/src/main/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersion.java
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@
  */
 
 import java.util.StringTokenizer;
+import java.util.regex.Pattern;
 
 /**
  * Default implementation of artifact versioning.
@@ -174,7 +175,8 @@ public final void parseVersion( String version )
                 }
                 if ( tok.hasMoreTokens() )
                 {
-                    fallback = true;
+                    qualifier = tok.nextToken();
+                    fallback = Pattern.compile("\\d+").matcher( qualifier ).matches();
                 }
 
                 // string tokenzier won't detect these and ignores them
@@ -213,34 +215,6 @@ private static Integer getNextIntegerToken( StringTokenizer tok )
     @Override
     public String toString()
     {
-        StringBuilder buf = new StringBuilder();
-        if ( majorVersion != null )
-        {
-            buf.append( majorVersion );
-        }
-        if ( minorVersion != null )
-        {
-            buf.append( "." );
-            buf.append( minorVersion );
-        }
-        if ( incrementalVersion != null )
-        {
-            buf.append( "." );
-            buf.append( incrementalVersion );
-        }
-        if ( buildNumber != null )
-        {
-            buf.append( "-" );
-            buf.append( buildNumber );
-        }
-        else if ( qualifier != null )
-        {
-            if ( buf.length() > 0 )
-            {
-                buf.append( "-" );
-            }
-            buf.append( qualifier );
-        }
-        return buf.toString();
+        return comparable.toString();
     }
 }
diff --git a/maven-artifact/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersionTest.java b/maven-artifact/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersionTest.java
index 9bb252d8ae..813210bb62 100644
--- a/maven-artifact/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersionTest.java
+++ b/maven-artifact/src/test/java/org/apache/maven/artifact/versioning/DefaultArtifactVersionTest.java
@@ -71,6 +71,8 @@ public void testVersionParsing()
         checkVersionParsing( "1.0.1b" , 0, 0, 0, 0, "1.0.1b" );
         checkVersionParsing( "1.0M2" , 0, 0, 0, 0, "1.0M2" );
         checkVersionParsing( "1.0RC2" , 0, 0, 0, 0, "1.0RC2" );
+        checkVersionParsing( "1.1.2.beta1", 1, 1, 2, 0, "beta1" );
+        checkVersionParsing( "1.7.3.beta1", 1, 7, 3, 0, "beta1" );
         checkVersionParsing( "1.7.3.0" , 0, 0, 0, 0, "1.7.3.0" );
         checkVersionParsing( "1.7.3.0-1" , 0, 0, 0, 0, "1.7.3.0-1" );
         checkVersionParsing( "PATCH-1193602" , 0, 0, 0, 0, "PATCH-1193602" );
@@ -97,6 +99,10 @@ public void testVersionComparing()
         assertVersionOlder( "1.0.0", "1.1" );
         assertVersionOlder( "1.1", "1.2.0" );
 
+        assertVersionOlder( "1.1.2.alpha1", "1.1.2" );
+        assertVersionOlder( "1.1.2.alpha1", "1.1.2.beta1" );
+        assertVersionOlder( "1.1.2.beta1", "1.2" );
+
         assertVersionOlder( "1.0-alpha-1", "1.0" );
         assertVersionOlder( "1.0-alpha-1", "1.0-alpha-2" );
         assertVersionOlder( "1.0-alpha-2", "1.0-alpha-15" );