500 Internal Server Error

I am running subversion 1.0.9 on a linux box using Apache and WebDav
interfaces. I am doing development on a windows machine and using the
Tortoise svn client to interact with the server. My repositories have been
up and running for a few months now with only two hiccups, and both where
due to the same problem which I am about to describe.

When I try to access my repository from Tortoise, I get the message:

 "ERROR * PROPFIND request failed on 'repos path' PROPFIND of 'repos path':
500 Internal Server Error".

The apache log is more telling:

(20014) Error string not specified yet: Berkely DB error while opening
'nodes' table for file system "path to db":\nDB_RUNRECOVERY: Fatal error,
run database recovery.

Running a "svnadmin recover 'path to repo'" does not fix the problem.

This is the second time this has happened. The first time I had to roll
back to a very old backup of the repository. It was a repos of personal
work so I did not care as much, but now it has happened to a repos of
substantial importance to me and I have a real dilemma.

I have not done anything to the database other than commits, and have not
touched the installation configuration of svn or apache. In fact my other
repos are still working.

Please help, I need to find what is causing this.

Thank you in advance.
Received on Fri Jan 14 17:58:39 2005