diff --git a/sphinx/writers/latex.py b/sphinx/writers/latex.py
index af1c6af7a..192207bce 100644
--- a/sphinx/writers/latex.py
+++ b/sphinx/writers/latex.py
@@ -1061,8 +1061,11 @@ class LaTeXTranslator(nodes.NodeVisitor):
                 self.remember_multirowcol[self.table.col] = node.get('morecols')
             self.table.col += node.get('morecols')
         if isinstance(node.parent.parent, nodes.thead):
-            self.body.append('\\textsf{\\relax ')
-            context += '}'
+            if len(node) == 1 and isinstance(node[0], nodes.paragraph) and node.astext() == '':
+                pass
+            else:
+                self.body.append('\\textsf{\\relax ')
+                context += '}'
         while self.remember_multirow.get(self.table.col + 1, 0):
             self.table.col += 1
             self.remember_multirow[self.table.col] -= 1
diff --git a/tests/root/markup.txt b/tests/root/markup.txt
index 9e8c6bc86..b322b39fa 100644
--- a/tests/root/markup.txt
+++ b/tests/root/markup.txt
@@ -187,6 +187,15 @@ Tables
    | 2  | Empty cells:   |    |
    +----+----------------+----+
 
+.. table:: empty cell in table header
+
+   ===== ======
+   \ 
+   ===== ======
+   1     2
+   3     4
+   ===== ======
+
 Tables with multirow and multicol:
 
 .. only:: latex