diff --git a/src/languageHandler.js b/src/languageHandler.js
index 798798b6e5..68e8ca6172 100644
--- a/src/languageHandler.js
+++ b/src/languageHandler.js
@@ -35,6 +35,25 @@ counterpart.setFallbackLocale('en');
 // just import counterpart and use it directly, we end up using a different
 // instance.
 export function _t(...args) {
+    // Horrible hack to avoid https://github.com/vector-im/riot-web/issues/4191
+    // The interpolation library that counterpart uses does not support undefined/null
+    // values and instead will throw an error. This is a problem since everywhere else
+    // in JS land passing undefined/null will simply stringify instead, and when converting
+    // valid ES6 template strings to i18n strings it's extremely easy to pass undefined/null
+    // if there are no existing null guards. To avoid this making the app completely inoperable,
+    // we'll check all the values for undefined/null and stringify them here.
+    if (args[1] && typeof args[1] === 'object') {
+        Object.keys(args[1]).forEach((k) => {
+            if (args[1][k] === undefined) {
+                console.warn("_t called with undefined interpolation name: " + k);
+                args[1][k] = 'undefined';
+            }
+            if (args[1][k] === null) {
+                console.warn("_t called with null interpolation name: " + k);
+                args[1][k] = 'null';
+            }
+        });
+    }
     return counterpart.translate(...args);
 }