diff --git a/src/eval.c b/src/eval.c
index 807efe2..03e3735 100644
--- a/src/eval.c
+++ b/src/eval.c
@@ -915,12 +915,13 @@
     /* autoloaded script names */
     ga_clear_strings(&ga_loaded);
 
-    /* script-local variables */
+    /* Script-local variables. First clear all the variables and in a second
+     * loop free the scriptvar_T, because a variable in one script might hold
+     * a reference to the whole scope of another script. */
     for (i = 1; i <= ga_scripts.ga_len; ++i)
-    {
 	vars_clear(&SCRIPT_VARS(i));
+    for (i = 1; i <= ga_scripts.ga_len; ++i)
 	vim_free(SCRIPT_SV(i));
-    }
     ga_clear(&ga_scripts);
 
     /* unreferenced lists and dicts */