diff --git a/configure b/configure
index fac604a01ed251..38bed643ff1cb0 100755
--- a/configure
+++ b/configure
@@ -299,6 +299,11 @@ parser.add_option('--enable-d8',
     dest='enable_d8',
     help=optparse.SUPPRESS_HELP)  # Unsupported, undocumented.
 
+parser.add_option('--enable-trace-maps',
+    action='store_true',
+    dest='trace_maps',
+    help='Enable the --trace-maps flag in V8 (use at your own risk)')
+
 parser.add_option('--v8-options',
     action='store',
     dest='v8_options',
@@ -964,6 +969,7 @@ def configure_v8(o):
   o['variables']['v8_optimized_debug'] = 0  # Compile with -O0 in debug builds.
   o['variables']['v8_random_seed'] = 0  # Use a random seed for hash tables.
   o['variables']['v8_use_snapshot'] = 'false' if options.without_snapshot else 'true'
+  o['variables']['v8_trace_maps'] = 1 if options.trace_maps else 0
   o['variables']['node_use_v8_platform'] = b(not options.without_v8_platform)
   o['variables']['node_use_bundled_v8'] = b(not options.without_bundled_v8)
   o['variables']['force_dynamic_crt'] = 1 if options.shared else 0
diff --git a/node.gyp b/node.gyp
index 345188257998e0..1b17d991ae3244 100644
--- a/node.gyp
+++ b/node.gyp
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 {
   'variables': {
     'v8_use_snapshot%': 'false',
+    'v8_trace_maps%': 0,
     'node_use_dtrace%': 'false',
     'node_use_lttng%': 'false',
     'node_use_etw%': 'false',