The problem occurs when configuring libcxxabi on x86_64 linux with:
$ cmake -DLLVM_PATH=$SRCTOP/llvm -DLIBCXXABI_LIBCXX_PATH=$SRCTOP/libcxx $SRCTOP/libcxxabi
[...]
CMake Error at llvm/cmake/modules/CheckCompilerVersion.cmake:31 (check_cxx_source_compiles):
Unknown CMake command "check_cxx_source_compiles".
Call Stack (most recent call first):
llvm/cmake/modules/HandleLLVMOptions.cmake:9 (include) CMakeLists.txt:61 (include)
The fix is to include the cmake file that defines check_cxx_source_compiles.