In trying to build PHP-3.0.14 on DEC Unix OSF1 V4.0F 1229
as a shared object for use with Apache-1.3.9, the final 
link of libphp3.so failed.

Here's the configure line:

./configure --prefix=/usr/opt/depot/php-3.0.14/ \
            --with-mysql=/usr/opt/depot/mysql-3.22.30 \
            --with-apxs=/usr/opt/depot/apache-1.3.9/bin/apxs \
            --with-xml

Here's the relevant bit of make output:

ld -shared -expect_unresolved * -s -o libphp3.so ./mod_php3.o libmodphp3-so.a -L/usr/local/lib -L/usr/opt/depot/mysql-3.22.30//lib/mysql -lmysqlclient -ldb pcrelib/libpcre.a -lm -lresolv -Lpcrelib -lpcre -rpath /usr/opt/depot/mysql-3.22.30//lib/mysql 
ld:
Object file format error in: CHANGES: read_cur_obj_info: bad file magic number(0x6f4e)
apxs:Break: Command failed with rc=65536
*** Exit 1
Stop.

Solution:

The asterisk in the argument to expect_unresolved is not quoted, and it expands to all of the files in the build directory, such as the CHANGES file.  I don't know what generates the argument to expect_uresolved, but it should generate a quoted asterisk '*' instead of a bare asterisk *.