"Fatal error, run database recovery " when there are no txns to recover.

Question

Hi, all.
I have a DB file containing multiple databases. Without using DBEnvironments, I can open it to get the dbnames. I can open the databases RDONLY,
and see that their contents are correct. I can open them RW, and everything works.
But when I try to create a new one, I get this:
D = bsddb3.db.DB()
D.open('test.db',dbname='test',dbtype=B.DB_BTREE,flags=B.DB_CREATE)Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
bsddb3.db.DBRunRecoveryError: (-30974, 'DB_RUNRECOVERY: Fatal error, run database recovery -- PANIC: fatal region error detected; run recovery')
Note that this is in the non-transactional case. There is no Env, and there are no logfiles or __db files. So the error code mystifies me.
Strace shows that the file is opened RW, and read through.
B.DB_VERSION_STRING'Berkeley DB 4.8.24: (August 14, 2009)'
>>>
So, where to proceed? Many thanks for any and all help.

Answer 1

Hmm. Other thing to note:
[tradedesk@vader 2010-05-06.test]$ /usr/local/BerkeleyDB.4.8/bin/db_verify foo.db
db_verify: Subdatabase entry references page 266 of invalid type 13
db_verify: Page 0: non-invalid page 40 on free list
db_verify: trading.db: DB_VERIFY_BAD: Database verification failed
Not sure how that came about or how to prevent it, but it might have to do wit this issue.