htaccess must be empty

From: Ivo (sandick_at_mail.com)
Date: 05/09/04 

Date: 8 May 2004 16:36:17 -0700

Greetings newsgroup,
I am moving some php scripts to a new host. While getting to know the
server, I ran into a strange problem.

If I add a .htaccess file, or more specifically: a .htaccess with
content, to a folder, requesting (html and php) files from that folder
results in internal server error messages.
If I upload an empty .htaccess file, all is fine. Then phpinfo() tells
me I am using Apache/1.3.27.

Where do I look to see what is wrong, and what can I do about it?
Many thanks, Ivo.