diff --git a/src/expression/node/SymbolNode.js b/src/expression/node/SymbolNode.js
index da92197191..14abe6ce49 100644
--- a/src/expression/node/SymbolNode.js
+++ b/src/expression/node/SymbolNode.js
@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ export const createSymbolNode = /* #__PURE__ */ factory(name, dependencies, ({ m
      * @param {string} name
      * @extends {Node}
      */
-    constructor (name) {
+    constructor (name, index) {
       super()
       // validate input
       if (typeof name !== 'string') {
@@ -36,6 +36,7 @@ export const createSymbolNode = /* #__PURE__ */ factory(name, dependencies, ({ m
       }
 
       this.name = name
+      this.tokenIndex = index;
     }
 
     get type () { return 'SymbolNode' }
diff --git a/src/expression/parse.js b/src/expression/parse.js
index 54ce64bfd1..ce2709d543 100644
--- a/src/expression/parse.js
+++ b/src/expression/parse.js
@@ -258,6 +258,7 @@ export const createParse = /* #__PURE__ */ factory(name, dependencies, ({
     state.tokenType = TOKENTYPE.NULL
     state.token = ''
     state.comment = ''
+    state.tokenIndex = state.index;
 
     // skip over ignored characters:
     while (true) {
@@ -668,9 +669,10 @@ export const createParse = /* #__PURE__ */ factory(name, dependencies, ({
       if (isSymbolNode(node)) {
         // parse a variable assignment like 'a = 2/3'
         name = node.name
+        const symbolIndex = state.tokenIndex - name.length;
         getTokenSkipNewline(state)
         value = parseAssignment(state)
-        return new AssignmentNode(new SymbolNode(name), value)
+        return new AssignmentNode(new SymbolNode(name, symbolIndex), value)
       } else if (isAccessorNode(node)) {
         // parse a matrix subset assignment like 'A[1,2] = 4'
         getTokenSkipNewline(state)
@@ -1331,7 +1333,8 @@ export const createParse = /* #__PURE__ */ factory(name, dependencies, ({
       } else if (NUMERIC_CONSTANTS.indexOf(name) !== -1) { // NaN, Infinity
         node = new ConstantNode(numeric(name, 'number'))
       } else {
-        node = new SymbolNode(name)
+        const symbolIndex = state.tokenIndex - name.length;
+        node = new SymbolNode(name, symbolIndex)
       }
 
       // parse function parameters and matrix index