diff --git a/Lib/xml/sax/_exceptions.py b/Lib/xml/sax/_exceptions.py
index 1553b93afb0..c02974fb8e7 100644
--- a/Lib/xml/sax/_exceptions.py
+++ b/Lib/xml/sax/_exceptions.py
@@ -37,7 +37,7 @@ def __str__(self):
     def __getitem__(self, ix):
         """Avoids weird error messages if someone does exception[ix] by
         mistake, since Exception has __getitem__ defined."""
-        raise NameError("__getitem__")
+        raise AttributeError("__getitem__")
 
 
 # ===== SAXPARSEEXCEPTION =====