diff --git a/se/se_epub_generate_toc.py b/se/se_epub_generate_toc.py
index aa46d680..e109645a 100644
--- a/se/se_epub_generate_toc.py
+++ b/se/se_epub_generate_toc.py
@@ -594,7 +594,6 @@ def evaluate_descendants(node: EasyXmlElement, toc_item: TocItem, textf: str) ->
 	# END DEBUG
 
 	children = node.xpath("./p | ./h1 | ./h2 | ./h3 | ./h4 | ./h5 | ./h6") # h# is now deprecated here, keeping for legacy purposes
-	child:EasyXmlElement = None
 	for child in children:  # we expect these to be p, h1, h2, h3, h4 etc
 		if not toc_item.lang:
 			toc_item.lang = child.get_attr("xml:lang")