diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index 978ccde6..f20d8f32 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -116,6 +116,7 @@
             <groupId>javax.servlet</groupId>
             <artifactId>servlet-api</artifactId>
             <version>2.4</version>
+            <optional>true</optional>
         </dependency>
         <dependency>
             <groupId>net.sourceforge.htmlcleaner</groupId>