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    6.2.3.Unclear cases: adjectival participles
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    Perfect and passive auxiliaries seem to be the only verbs that require the verb they govern to have the form of a participle. This section discusses a set of cases that constitute apparent counterexamples to this claim. The key issue in these cases is that their participles can be either verbal or adjectival in nature and that it is often not immediately clear what categorial type we are dealing with; see Section A9 for a detailed discussion of the difference between verbal and adjectival participles. Word order of the clause-final verb cluster in the northern varieties of Standard Dutch should provide a test for establishing the categorial status of participles: adjectival participles must precede the verbs in clause-final position, whereas verbal participles can also follow them. Unfortunately, however, speaker judgments are not always sharp, as a result of which it is sometimes impossible to draw firm conclusions. Haeseryn (1990: Section 2.5.2), who also provides a review of the literature on this issue, suggests that speakers sometimes extend the prescriptive norm of using the aux-part order in verb clusters to cases in which participles are used as complementives. This would be in line with his claim that this type of "hypercorrection" occurs especially in careful language use.

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    [+]  I.  The verb raken/krijgen'to get' + participle (semi-copular constructions)

    A first potential counterexample to the claim that only perfect and passive auxiliaries select a verb in the form of a participle is given in (111a), in which the verb raken'to get' seems to select the participial form of the verb irriteren'to annoy'. There are, however, reasons for assuming that we are dealing with a semi-copular construction of the type in (111b), in which gewond'injured' must be seen as a pseudo-participle as the corresponding verb wonden is obsolete and replaced by the morphologically more complex verb verwonden in present-day Dutch. If this line of reasoning also applies to (111a), the participle geïrriteerd is not verbal but adjectival, and the primed examples in (111) show that this correctly predicts that it behaves just like the pseudo-participle in that it must precede the verb raken in clause-final position. Since the (a)-examples in (111) are more extensively discussed in Section 2.5.1.3, sub IID, we refer the reader to this section for further discussion.

    111
    a. Peter raakt snel geïrriteerd.
      Peter  gets  quickly  annoyed
      'Peter gets annoyed quickly.'
    a'. dat Peter snel <geïrriteerd> raakt <*geïrriteerd>.
      that  Peter quickly   annoyed  gets
      'that Peter gets annoyed quickly.'
    b. Jan raakte bij het ongeluk gewond.
      Jan  got  in the accident  injured
      'Jan got injured in the accident.'
    b'. dat Jan bij het ongeluk <gewond> raakte <*gewond>.
      that  Jan in the accident     injured  got
      'that Jan got injured in the accident.'

    Haeseryn et al. (1997:962) mention cases similar to (111a) with the verb krijgen'to get', but again the position of the participle with respect to the finite verb in clauses-final position suggests that we are dealing with a semi-copular construction; an example such as (112a) can be given a similar analysis as the construction in (112b). We refer the reader to Section A6.2.1, sub I, for a more extensive discussion of this type of semi-copular construction.

    112
    a. dat hij zijn auto niet meer <gerepareerd> krijgt <*gerepareerd>.
      that  he  his car  not  anymore     repaired  gets
      'that he cannot get his car repaired anymore.'
    b. dat hij zijn schoenen niet meer <schoon> krijgt <*schoon>.
      that  he  his shoes  not  anymore    clean  gets
      'that he cannot get his shoes clean anymore.'
    [+]  II.  Modal verb + participle

    In a limited number of cases modal verbs may take a participle as their complement. Since such constructions normally alternate with constructions with an additional perfect or passive auxiliary, Haeseryn et al. (1997:960-2) suggest that they are derived by elision of the auxiliary. Although this seems plausible at first sight, things may not be as simple as that. The following subsections discuss two cases: we start with modal verbs like lijken'to appear', schijnen'to seem' and blijken'to turn out', which may take a te-infinitival clause as their complement, after which we discuss modal verb like moeten'must' and kunnen'can', which may take a bare infinitival clause as their complement.

    [+]  A.  Lijken'to appear', schijnen'to seem' and blijken'to turn out'

    Haeseryn et al. (1997:960-1) observe that modal verbs like lijken'to appear', schijnen'to seem' and blijken'to turn out' are often combined with a participle. The examples in (113) show that such cases always alternate with infinitival constructions with the perfect auxiliary zijn (we assume that the verb zijn in passive constructions is indeed a perfect auxiliary). Haeseryn et al. further claim that the two alternants do not differ in meaning and therefore suggest that the perfect auxiliary zijn can simply be left unexpressed.

    113
    a. dat Jan al gearriveerd bleek (te zijn).
      that  Jan already  arrived turned.out   to be
      'that Jan turned out to have arrived already.'
    b. dat deze brief al beantwoord lijkt/schijnt (te zijn).
      that  this letter  already  answered  appears/seems   to be
      'that this letter appears/seems to have been answered already.'

    An elision analysis of this kind is slightly suspect given that this analysis has to stipulate that this type of alternation is restricted to zijn'to be', as is clear from the fact that the examples in (114) do not alternate with constructions without the perfect auxiliary hebben'have'.

    114
    a. dat Jan geslapen bleek *(te hebben).
      that  Jan slept  turned.out     to have
      'that Jan turned out to have slept.'
    b. dat Marie deze brief al beantwoord lijkt/schijnt *(te hebben).
      that  Marie  this letter  already  answered  appears/seems     to have
      'that Marie seems/appears to have answered this letter already.'

    Similar alternations are, however, very common with the copular verb zijn'to be', for which reason modal verbs like lijken'to appear', schijnen'to seem' and blijken'to turn out' are normally also listed as copular verbs in traditional grammars.

    115
    a. dat Peter leraar/erg aardig bleek (te zijn).
      that  Peter  teacher/very kind  turned.out   to be
      'that Peter turned out to be a teacher/very kind.'
    b. dat Marie de beste kandidaat/intelligent lijkt (te zijn).
      that  Marie the best candidate/intelligent  appears   to be
      'that Marie appears to be the best candidate/intelligent.'

    A potentially viable analysis for the examples in (113) without te zijn is therefore that we are concerned with copula-like constructions, in which the modal verbs take a complementive in the form of an adjectival participle. If so, we make certain predictions about the placement options of the participles. Since the meaning of the examples in (113) clearly indicates that zijn is a perfect auxiliary, we expect the placement of the participles to be quite free, and the examples in (116) show that this expectation is indeed borne out; the participle need not appear before the finite verb in clause-final position but can also appear in the positions indicated by ✓.

    116
    a. dat Jan al <gearriveerd> bleek ✓ te zijn ✓.
      that Jan  already    arrived turned.out  to be
      'that Jan turned out to have arrived already.'
    b. dat deze brief al <beantwoord> lijkt/schijnt ✓ te zijn ✓.
      that  this letter already    answered  appears/seems  to be
      'that this letter appears/seems to have been answered already.'

    If the corresponding constructions without te zijn are indeed copular-like constructions, the participles are adjectival in nature and therefore must precede the finite verb. Unfortunately, speakers seem to vary in their acceptability judgments: while some speakers object to placing the participle in the positions marked by a percentage sign, others do more or less accept it. For this reason, we are not able to draw any firm conclusions at this moment.

    117
    a. dat Jan al <gearriveerd> bleek <%gearriveerd>.
      that Jan  already    arrived turned.out
      'that Jan turned out to have arrived already.'
    b. dat deze brief al <beantwoord> lijkt/schijnt <%beantwoord>.
      that  this letter already    answered  appears/seems
      'that this letter appears/seems to have been answered already.'

    The variation in speakers' judgments on the examples in (117) may be due to the fact that, as was also noticed by Haeseryn et al. (1997:960), the constructions without te zijn are less common than those with te zijn. In fact, despite that Haeseryn et al. claim that there is no stylistic difference between the two alternants, we tend to think that the construction without te zijn belongs to the more formal, artificial register. The tendency to accept the orders in (117) marked by a percentage sign may therefore involve hypercorrection of the sort suggested above.

    [+]  B.  Moeten'must', kunnen'can', etc.

    Haeseryn et al. (1997:961-2) claim that passive auxiliaries can be omitted in passive constructions with a modal verb of the type moeten'must'. Some instances exemplifying this are given in (118).

    118
    a. Die rommel moet opgeruimd (worden).
      that mess  must  prt.-cleared   be
      'That mess must be cleared.'
    b. Die lege flessen kunnen weggegooid (worden).
      those empty bottles  can  away-thrown   be
      'Those empty bottles can be thrown away.'

    There is, however, an alternative analysis for the construction without the passive auxiliary, in which the participles simply function as adjectival complementives. That modals can be combined with adjectival complementives is clear from the examples in (119).

    119
    a. Dat hek moet groen.
      that gate  must  green
      'That gate must be painted green.'
    b. Die fles moet leeg.
      that bottle  must  empty
      'That bottle must be emptied.'

    Of course, one might assume that examples such as (119) can also be derived from some more complex structure by elision of a larger verbal string consisting of the passive auxiliary and some passivized main verb; cf. the English renderings in (119). Barbiers (1995) refuted hypotheses of this sort, however, by showing that the addition of an agentive door-phrase requires such verbs to be present; if these verbs were simply phonetically suppressed but semantically present in examples such as (119), this contrast would be unexpected. The same argument carries over to examples such as (118); the examples in (121) show that agentive door-phrases are only possible if the passive auxiliary is present.

    120
    a. Dat hek moet door Peter groen *(geverfd worden).
      that gate  must  by Peter  green    painted  be
      'That gate must be painted green by Peter.'
    b. Die fles moet door Marie leeg *(gemaakt worden).
      that bottle  must  by Marie  empty     made  be
      'That bottle must be emptied by Marie.'
    121
    a. Die rommel moet door Peter opgeruimd *(worden).
      that mess  must  by Peter  prt.-cleared     be
      'That mess must be cleared by Peter.'
    b. Die lege flessen kunnen door Els weggegooid *(worden).
      those empty bottles  can  by Els  away-thrown     be
      'Those empty bottles can be thrown away by Els.'

    If the participles in examples such as (118) function as complementives if no passive auxiliary is present, we expect them to precede the modal in embedded clauses. Again, however, speaker judgments are not very sharp, which might be related to the fact noted by Haeseryn et al. (1997:961) that constructions such as these are normally main clauses. Our own intuition is that the position preceding the modal verb is highly preferred but some of our informants allow the participle in both positions.

    122
    a. dat de rommel <opgeruimd> moet <%opgeruimd>.
      that  the mess    prt.-cleared  must
      'that the mess must be cleared.'
    b. dat de flessen <weggegooid> moeten <%weggegooid>
      that  the bottles    away-thrown  must
      'that the bottles must be thrown away.'
    [+]  C.  Conclusion

    The previous subsections have discussed cases in which modal verbs seem to take a participle as their complement. There are accounts of such constructions that are fully in line with our earlier claim that participles only occur as complements of perfect and passive auxiliaries: it is simply assumed that these auxiliaries are present but not morphologically expressed. Our discussion has shown, however, that there are reasons not to adopt these proposals and instead assume that the participles in question are not verbal but adjectival in nature. This proposal makes a sharp prediction about word order: the adjectival participles must precede the verbs in clause-final construction. Unfortunately, speaker judgments are not always sharp and some of our informants even report that they fully accept orders that are expected to be unacceptable. Perhaps, this situation simply reflects that such cases normally involve the formal, more artificial register of the language and are thus cases of hypercorrection, but we leave this issue open for future investigation.

    [+]  III.  Fixed expressions consisting of a verb and a participle

    Haeseryn et al. (1997:963-4) mention a set of collocations consisting of a verb and a participle. Some examples are: (ergens) begraven liggen'to be buried (somewhere)'; (iemand iets) betaald zetten'to get even with someone'; (zich) gewonnen/verloren geven'to admit defeat'; geschreven/vermeld/genoteerd staan'to be recorded', verschoond blijven (van)'to be spared'; opgescheept zitten (met)'to be stuck with'. As Haeseryn et al. notice themselves, there is reason to doubt that the participles are verbal in nature, as they normally precede the finite verb in clause-final position; although acceptability judgment seem to vary from case to case and person to person, placing the participle after the finite verb is always the marked option and in many cases simply excluded. The judgments given here are ours; Haeseryn et al. seem to consider the V-participle order in (123c) fully acceptable.

    123
    a. dat we Peter die streek <betaald> zetten <*betaald>.
      that  we Peter  that trick     paid  put
      'that weʼll get even with Peter for that trick.'
    b. dat Jan hier <begraven> ligt <??begraven>.
      that  Jan here    buried  lies
      'that Jan lies buried here.'
    c. dat we met die boeken <opgescheept> zitten <?opgescheept>.
      that  we  with these books     prt.-stuck  sit
      'that weʼre stuck with these books.'

    If the participles in the examples above are indeed adjectival in nature, we immediately account for the fact illustrated in (124) that examples like these do not exhibit the infinitivus-pro-participio (IPP) effect; if the participles marked "A" are indeed adjectival, the participles marked "V" are the most deeply embedded verbs, and we therefore correctly predict that they must surface as a past participle in the perfect tense. This also accounts for the severe ungrammaticality of the primed examples; adjectival participles normally precede the verb cluster.

    124
    a. dat we Peter die streek betaaldA hebben gezetV.
      that  we Peter  that trick  paid  have  put
      'that weʼve gotten even with Peter for that trick.'
    a'. * dat we Peter die streek hebben gezetV betaaldA.
    b. dat Jan hier enige tijd begravenA heeft gelegenV.
      that  Jan  here  some time  buried  has  lain
      'that Jan has lain buried here for some time.'
    b'. * dat Jan hier enige tijd heeft gelegenV begravenA.
    c. dat we jaren met die boeken opgescheeptA hebben gezetenV.
      that  we years  with these books  prt.-stuck  have  sat
      'that we have been stuck with these books for years.'
    c'. dat we jaren met die boeken hebben gezetenV opgescheeptA.

    For completeness' sake, example (125a) shows that adjectival participles may permeate the verb cluster provided they precede the main verb. Example (125b) shows that in this respect they behave just like "true" adjectives. We refer the reader to Section 7.4 for detailed discussion.

    125
    a. dat we Peter die streek hebben betaaldA gezetV.
      that  we Peter  that trick  have  paid  put
      'that weʼve gotten even with Peter for that trick.'
    b. dat we het hek hebben geel geverfd.
      that  we  the gate  have  yellow  painted
      'that weʼve painted the gate yellow.'
    [+]  IV.  The verb komen'to come' + participle

    Potentially genuine counterexamples to the claim that verbal participles can only be found as complements of perfect and passive auxiliaries are given in (126). These examples suggest that the verb komen'to come' is able to select either an infinitive or a participle. The two constructions are restricted in the sense that the verb selected by komen must be a verb of movement accompanied by a directional phrase like de tuin in'into the garden' or the verbal particle aan, which indicates that the entity referred to by the subject of the clause approaches the speaker. The crucial thing is that the alternative placements of the participles in the primed examples are equally felicitous, which may be taken as evidence for assuming that we are dealing with verbal participles.

    126
    a. dat Jan de tuin in kwam fietsen.
      that  Jan the garden  into  came  cycle
      'that Jan cycled into the garden.'
    a'. dat Jan de tuin in <gefietst> kwam <gefietst>.
      that  Jan the garden  into    cycled  came
    b. dat Jan snel kwam aanfietsen.
      that  Jan quickly  came  prt-cycle/cycled
      'that Jan quickly cycled towards us.'
    b'. dat Jan snel <aangefietst> kwam <aangefietst>.
      that  Jan quickly     prt-cycled  came

    Haeseryn et al. (1997: 964-5) claim that the primeless and primed examples in (126) are identical in meaning and simply differ in their geographical distribution: participles are preferred by speakers of the southern varieties, whereas speakers of the northern varieties prefer the infinitive. They further claim that the construction with a participle is more restricted than the one with an infinitive: in the perfect-tense constructions in (127), the verb fietsen'to cycle' must take the infinitival form.

    127
    a. dat Jan de tuin in is komen fietsen.
      that  Jan the garden  into  is  comeinf  cycle
      'that Jan has cycled into the garden.'
    a'. * dat Jan de tuin in is komen gefietst.
      that  Jan the garden  into  is  comeinf  cycled
    b. dat Jan snel is komen aanfietsen.
      that  Jan quickly  is comeinf  prt.-cycle
      'that Jan has quickly cycled towards us.'
    b'. * dat Jan snel is komen aangefietst.
      that  Jan quickly  is comeinf  prt.-cycled

    However, the impossibility of the participle gefietst in the primed examples might encourage one to claim that, despite the fact that the participle may follow komen in clause-final position in the primed examples in (126), the participle is adjectival in nature after all. If so, we would predict that the unacceptable examples with the participle gefietst improve when gefietst precedes the verb komen in its participial form (there is of course no reason to expect the IPP-effect if the participle gefietst is adjectival in nature). Judgments on the examples in (128) vary a great deal: some of our informants judge them to be worse than the primed examples in (127), others judge them to be better, whereas some (especially speakers of the southern varieties of Dutch) judge them to be acceptable, provided that the participle gekomen precedes the auxiliary. The marked character of the constructions in (128) makes it impossible to draw any firm conclusion, especially since we have not been able to find examples of this sort on the internet.

    128
    a. % dat Jan de tuin in gefietst <gekomen> is <gekomen>.
      that  Jan the garden  into  cycled    comepart  is
      'that Jan has cycled into the garden.'
    b. % dat Jan aangefietst <gekomen> is <gekomen>.
      that  Jan prt.-cycled    comepart  is
      'that Jan has cycled into the garden.'

    Better evidence in favor of assuming that the participle is adjectival in nature is provided by Duinhoven (1997:551-2), who observes the contrast between the examples in (129). The diacritics given here are his and show that although Duinhoven considers the use of the participle marked compared to the use of an infinitive, using the participle is acceptable if it is placed in front of the verb komen. Note that in this case we did find several instances (probably from Belgium) of the order zie ..... aan-V komen on the internet for the verbs wandelen/lopen'to walk', rennen'to run' and vliegen'to fly'. Duinhoven explicitly states that the contrast between the two orders in (129b) shows that the participle is adjectival in nature.

    129
    a. Ik zie Jan komen aanfietsen.
      I  see  Jan  come  prt-cycle
    b. Ik zie Jan <?aangefietst> komen <*aangefietst>.
      I  see  Jan      prt.-cycled  come

    Duinhoven (1997:281ff.) also shows that the construction of komen + participle was very common in medieval Dutch, and actually did not require the addition of a directional phrase or the verbal particle aan. He argues that the participle originally functioned as a manner adverb that modified the verb komen'to come', which is in fact compatible with the fact that the participle is normally optional, also in present-day Dutch.

    130
    a. Jan kwam het huis uit (gewandeld).
      Jan  came  the house  out.of   walked
      'Jan came (walking) out of the house.'
    b. Jan kwam de tuin in (gelopen).
      Jan  came  the garden  into   cycled
      'Jan came (walking) into the garden.'

    On this view, the komen'to come' + participle construction is a relic from an older stage of the language, which is under pressure of disappearing, that is, being replaced by the corresponding infinitival construction. For our present discussion it is important that the claim that the participle has or, at least, originally had an adverbial function implies that it is adjectival and not verbal in nature. This means that the komen + participle construction is special and cannot be taken as a straightforward counterexample to our claim that verbal participles are found as complements of perfect and passive auxiliaries only.

    References:
    • Barbiers, Sjef1995The syntax of interpretationThe Hague, Holland Academic GraphicsUniversity of Leiden/HILThesis
    • Duinhoven, A.M1997Middel-Nederlandse syntaxis: synchroon en diachroon 2. De werkwoordgroepGroningenMartinus Nijhoff
    • Duinhoven, A.M1997Middel-Nederlandse syntaxis: synchroon en diachroon 2. De werkwoordgroepGroningenMartinus Nijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter1990Syntactische normen in het Nederlands. Een empirisch onderzoek naar woordvolgordevariatie in de werkwoordelijke eindgroepUniversity of NijmegenThesis
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    • Haeseryn, Walter, Romijn, Kirsten, Geerts, Guido, Rooij, Jaap de & Toorn, Maarten C. van den1997Algemene Nederlandse spraakkunstGroningenNijhoff
    About this article
    Author(s): Hans Broekhuis, Norbert Corver
    Category: Dutch Syntax
    Keywords: Adjectival ParticipleIdiomInfinitiveParticiple
    Version: 1.0, January 2016
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