diff --git a/libmount/src/context.c b/libmount/src/context.c
index d38e3671f..411f98f3f 100644
--- a/libmount/src/context.c
+++ b/libmount/src/context.c
@@ -2097,6 +2097,11 @@ int mnt_context_prepare_helper(struct libmnt_context *cxt, const char *name,
 	if (!ns_old)
 		return -MNT_ERR_NAMESPACE;
 
+	/* Record number of '.' in `type` so we can try a few things later. */
+	int dot_count = 0;
+	for (int i=0; type[i]; i++)
+		dot_count += (type[i] == '.');
+
 	/* Ignore errors when search in $PATH and do not modify @rc
 	 */
 	path = strtok_r(search_path, ":", &p);
@@ -2112,8 +2117,8 @@ int mnt_context_prepare_helper(struct libmnt_context *cxt, const char *name,
 			continue;
 
 		found = mnt_is_path(helper);
-		if (!found && strchr(type, '.')) {
-			/* If type ends with ".subtype" try without it */
+		/* If type contains '.' then try without them. */
+		for (int cnt = dot_count; !found && cnt; --cnt) {
 			char *hs = strrchr(helper, '.');
 			if (hs)
 				*hs = '\0';