diff --git a/.gitmodules b/.gitmodules
index 90630ae1a0..ccdee243b2 100644
--- a/.gitmodules
+++ b/.gitmodules
@@ -7,9 +7,6 @@
 [submodule "extern/partition"]
 	path = extern/partition
 	url = ../../lsst/partition
-[submodule "extern/db"]
-	path = extern/db
-	url = ../../lsst/db
 [submodule "extern/utils"]
 	path = extern/utils
 	url = ../../lsst/utils
diff --git a/CMakeLists.txt b/CMakeLists.txt
index 5f8f984399..26d30b2240 100644
--- a/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -11,10 +11,9 @@ enable_testing()
 include(GNUInstallDirs)
 set(CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX ${PROJECT_BINARY_DIR}/install)
 
-# utils iw Python-only, so just install with pip instead of embedded cmake 
+# utils is Python-only, so just install with pip instead of embedded cmake
 install(CODE "execute_process(COMMAND pip3 install ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}/extern/utils -t ${CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX}/python --no-deps --no-compile)")
 
-add_subdirectory(extern/db)
 add_subdirectory(extern/log)
 add_subdirectory(extern/partition)
 add_subdirectory(extern/sphgeom)
@@ -23,6 +22,6 @@ add_subdirectory(src)
 
 # TODO do we want to add cmake capability to the qserv_web project?
 install(
-    DIRECTORY ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}/extern/qserv_web/www 
+    DIRECTORY ${CMAKE_CURRENT_SOURCE_DIR}/extern/qserv_web/www
     DESTINATION ${CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX}/qserv/dashboard
 )
diff --git a/extern/db b/extern/db
deleted file mode 160000
index dc2b393a8f..0000000000
--- a/extern/db
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1 +0,0 @@
-Subproject commit dc2b393a8f801f9ef5ee41d08ee52b4b603fc441