diff --git a/Library/Homebrew/metafiles.rb b/Library/Homebrew/metafiles.rb
index 95404030ffe0c4f27f313c8ceeccd2f46bb2ca77..5b8cd0da05eca9c8ab188517b4a266c4a4f0bc82 100644
--- a/Library/Homebrew/metafiles.rb
+++ b/Library/Homebrew/metafiles.rb
@@ -4,15 +4,13 @@
 #
 # @api private
 module Metafiles
+  LICENSES = Set.new(%w[copying copyright license licence]).freeze
   # https://github.com/github/markup#markups
   EXTENSIONS = Set.new(%w[
                          .adoc .asc .asciidoc .creole .html .markdown .md .mdown .mediawiki .mkdn
                          .org .pod .rdoc .rst .rtf .textile .txt .wiki
                        ]).freeze
-  BASENAMES = Set.new(%w[
-                        about authors changelog changes copying copyright history license licence
-                        news notes notice readme todo
-                      ]).freeze
+  BASENAMES = Set.new(%w[about authors changelog changes history news notes notice readme todo]).freeze
 
   module_function
 
@@ -24,6 +22,8 @@ module Metafiles
 
   def copy?(file)
     file = file.downcase
+    return true if LICENSES.include? file.split(".").first
+
     ext  = File.extname(file)
     file = File.basename(file, ext) if EXTENSIONS.include?(ext)
     BASENAMES.include?(file)