Git archive and trailing "/" in prefix

Hi!

The git-archive man page indicates that if the --prefix option is passed to
git-archive, it is compulsory to end the prefix with a "/"

 git archive [--format=<fmt>] [--list] [--prefix=<prefix>/] [<extra>] ...

As a matter of fact, the archiver behaves quite strangely if that slash is
missing. Files in the root of the working dir are added to the archive with
their own name modified by the prefix and the same happens for working dir
sub-directories. However, no file present in the sub-directories, nor
sub-sub-directories are added.

I would like to know if there some reason why a trailing "/" is not added
automatically to the prefix when it is missing and the prefix is not empty.
Would that break anything?

Thanks!

Sergio