diff --git a/Lib/test/test_class.py b/Lib/test/test_class.py
index 6c91deb..26b8e7a 100644
--- a/Lib/test/test_class.py
+++ b/Lib/test/test_class.py
@@ -172,6 +172,14 @@
 
 # List/dict operations
 
+class Empty: pass
+
+try:
+    1 in Empty()
+    print 'failed, should have raised TypeError'
+except TypeError:
+    pass
+
 1 in testme
 
 testme[1]
diff --git a/Misc/NEWS b/Misc/NEWS
index 9631d4f..5c575c9 100644
--- a/Misc/NEWS
+++ b/Misc/NEWS
@@ -12,6 +12,8 @@
 Core and builtins
 -----------------
 
+- Bug #1591996: Correctly forward exception in instance_contains().
+
 - Bug #1588287: fix invalid assertion for `1,2` in debug builds.
 
 - Bug #1576657: when setting a KeyError for a tuple key, make sure that
diff --git a/Objects/classobject.c b/Objects/classobject.c
index 7680a3d..8560b68 100644
--- a/Objects/classobject.c
+++ b/Objects/classobject.c
@@ -1318,15 +1318,17 @@
 
 	/* Couldn't find __contains__. */
 	if (PyErr_ExceptionMatches(PyExc_AttributeError)) {
+		Py_ssize_t rc;
 		/* Assume the failure was simply due to that there is no
 		 * __contains__ attribute, and try iterating instead.
 		 */
 		PyErr_Clear();
-		return _PySequence_IterSearch((PyObject *)inst, member,
-					      PY_ITERSEARCH_CONTAINS) > 0;
+		rc = _PySequence_IterSearch((PyObject *)inst, member,
+					    PY_ITERSEARCH_CONTAINS);
+		if (rc >= 0)
+			return rc > 0;
 	}
-	else
-		return -1;
+	return -1;
 }
 
 static PySequenceMethods