diff --git a/examples/reify.zig b/examples/reify.zig
index 29a17a4..cee5213 100644
--- a/examples/reify.zig
+++ b/examples/reify.zig
@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ const source =
     \\	# and a trailing newline for good measure
     \\	>
     \\tuple: [ no, 127 ]
-    \\enume: third
+    \\enume: .third
     \\taggart:
     \\	first: string a thing
     \\list:
diff --git a/src/parser.zig b/src/parser.zig
index 394251a..500b42a 100644
--- a/src/parser.zig
+++ b/src/parser.zig
@@ -93,6 +93,15 @@ pub const Options = struct {
     // option to change this.
     null_scalars: []const []const u8 = &.{ "null", "nil", "None" },
 
+    // Only used by the parseTo family of functions.
+    // Choose whether to strip the leading `.` off of expected enum values. By default,
+    // `.enum_field` will be parsed into the enum field `enum_field`, which makes them
+    // look like source code enum literals. Any enum value missing the leading `.` will
+    // result in a conversion error. If set to false, no preprocessing will be done
+    // and enum values will be converted from the literal scalar/string. These two styles
+    // cannot be mixed in a single document.
+    expect_enum_dot: bool = true,
+
     // Only used by the parseTo family of functions.
     // Perform ASCII-case-insensitive comparisons for scalars (i.e. `TRUE` in a document
     // will match `true` in the boolean scalars. Unicode case folding is not currently
diff --git a/src/parser/value.zig b/src/parser/value.zig
index f169a26..bfbc4e8 100644
--- a/src/parser/value.zig
+++ b/src/parser/value.zig
@@ -244,7 +244,14 @@ pub const Value = union(enum) {
                 switch (self) {
                     inline .scalar, .string => |str, tag| {
                         if (tag == .string and !options.coerce_strings) return error.BadValue;
-                        if (std.meta.stringToEnum(T, str)) |value| return value;
+                        const name = if (options.expect_enum_dot) blk: {
+                            if (str.len > 0 and str[0] == '.')
+                                break :blk str[1..]
+                            else
+                                return error.BadValue;
+                        } else str;
+
+                        if (std.meta.stringToEnum(T, name)) |value| return value;
                         if (options.allow_numeric_enums) {
                             const parsed = std.fmt.parseInt(@typeInfo(T).Enum.tag_type, str, 10) catch
                                 return error.BadValue;