diff --git a/CHANGELOG b/CHANGELOG
index c4a3071..3f84b1c 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG
+++ b/CHANGELOG
@@ -1,3 +1,5 @@
+* Fix order of replacement in String#unescapeHTML [#544 state:resolved] (SWeini, kangax)
+
 * Fix issue where a Selector query rooted on a node that had not been attached to the document failed in IE. [#464 state:resolved] (jddalton, kangax, Douglas Fraser, Andrew Dupont)
 
 * Fix Selector to match elements with attributes containing hyphens. [#285 state:resolved] (leiyou, jddalton, kangax)
diff --git a/src/lang/string.js b/src/lang/string.js
index 5530ebb..47f4ba6 100644
--- a/src/lang/string.js
+++ b/src/lang/string.js
@@ -431,7 +431,7 @@ if (Prototype.Browser.WebKit || Prototype.Browser.IE) Object.extend(String.proto
     return this.replace(/&/g,'&amp;').replace(/</g,'&lt;').replace(/>/g,'&gt;');
   },
   unescapeHTML: function() {
-    return this.stripTags().replace(/&amp;/g,'&').replace(/&lt;/g,'<').replace(/&gt;/g,'>');
+    return this.stripTags().replace(/&lt;/g,'<').replace(/&gt;/g,'>').replace(/&amp;/g,'&');
   }
 });
 
diff --git a/test/unit/string_test.js b/test/unit/string_test.js
index 3590579..a0b016c 100644
--- a/test/unit/string_test.js
+++ b/test/unit/string_test.js
@@ -255,6 +255,8 @@ new Test.Unit.Runner({
     this.assertEqual('1\n2', '1\n2'.unescapeHTML());
     this.assertEqual('Pride & Prejudice', '<h1>Pride &amp; Prejudice</h1>'.unescapeHTML());
     
+    this.assertIdentical('&lt;', '&amp;lt;'.unescapeHTML());
+    
     this.benchmark(function() { largeTextEscaped.unescapeHTML() }, 1000);
     
   },