State-of-affairs nouns (sometimes called event or process nouns) refer to actions (verwoestingdestruction), processes (valfall), positions (verblijfstay), states (bewusteloosheidunconsciousness), and the like. Because these states of affairs take place or hold at a particular time and place, state-of-affairs nouns can be modified by time or place adverbials. Similarly, because states of affairs have participants, these nouns have arguments like agents, themes and recipients, even if these arguments are often not overtly present.

Let us consider some examples. The head noun verwoestingdestruction in (80a) denotes an action, the noun valfall in (80b) denotes a process, the noun wonenliving in (80c) denotes a position and the noun hebbenhaving in (80d) denotes a state. In all these examples, the head noun is complemented by one or more noun phrases referring to the participant(s) in the state of affairs referred to by the noun phrase as a whole; cf. Section 16.2.3 for a more detailed discussion of these complements. Note that the state-of-affairs nouns in (80) are all derived from verbs; given their meaning, this is not surprising.

Proposition nouns are sometimes also referred to as content nouns; they denote entities such as facts, ideas, assumptions, beliefs, etc. These entities function as propositions in the sense that they can be given a truth value: they can be said to be true or untrue, believed or denied, agreed or disagreed with, and so on. The nouns in question have a complement, which typically takes the form of a clause or a PP: in (81a-c) the noun is complemented by a dat-clause, which provides the content of the proposition, and in (81d) a van-PP is used.

Like state-of-affairs nouns, proposition nouns are typically, though not necessarily, deverbal; cf. the use of the simple nouns feitfact and ideeidea in (81a&b). In the deverbal cases, the input verb belongs to the class of so-called verbs of thinking (like gelovento believe, aannemento assume, veronderstellento suppose, denkento think, etc.) or verbs denoting actions requiring some mental activity on the part of the speaker or hearer (like implicerento imply, bewijzento prove, etc.).

The primed examples in (82) show that deverbal proposition nouns all seem to have infinitival counterparts that are clearly related in meaning.

Nevertheless, there are important semantic and syntactic differences between the two forms. In terms of semantics, deverbal proposition nouns like aanname, argumentatie, and redenering denote the content of the argument or (line of) reasoning, whereas the infinitival nouns function as state-of-affairs nouns, denoting the action of arguing or reasoning. In other words, while the former are preferred in contexts such as (83a) where it is the content that is referred to, the latter are more acceptable in contexts such as (83b) where an action is referred to.

We refer the reader to Section 16.2.3.2 for a more detailed discussion of these forms and the syntactic differences between them (such as the optional/obligatory realization of the complement).

Speech-act nouns denote a type of abstract entity that can be described as a speech act. Nouns of this type, such as vraagquestion, bevelorder, beloftepromise, verzoekrequest, and mededelingannouncement denote some form of verbal interaction, and are typically derived from verbs that denote such activities, i.e. the input verb is a verb of saying like vragento ask, bevelento order, belovento promise, verzoekento request, and so on.

Like proposition nouns, speech-act nouns can take a clausal complement introduced by a complementizer denoting the content of the speech act. This is illustrated in example (84) for the speech-act nouns mededelingannouncement and verzekeringassurance. These nouns are clearly like their corresponding verbs meedelento announce and verzekerento assure in that they take a clausal complement introduced by the complementizer datthat; cf. Hij deelde mee dat de trein vertraagd wasHe announced that the train was delayed and Hij verzekerde ons dat probleem niet ernstig wasHe assured us that the problem was not serious

The clausal complement of the speech-act noun vraagquestion is interrogative. As with the verb vragento ask, the interrogative complement can be a yes/no-question, introduced by the complementizer of, or a wh-question, introduced by a wh-phrase; cf. Jan vroeg of we moesten komenJan asked whether ... and Jan vroeg hoe we nu moesten handelenJan asked how ....

Speech-act nouns can also take an infinitival complement introduced by the complementizer om, provided that the input verb is also able to do so. The implied subject PRO of the infinitival complement clause is interpreted as coreferential with an argument of the speech-act noun. Which argument functions as antecedent depends on the context, just as in the case of verbs; cf. Section V5.2.2.1 for further discussion. The examples in (86) serve to illustrate this: in (86a) it is the genitive noun phrase Jans, referring to the person making the request, that is interpreted as coreferential with PRO, and in (86b) it is the noun phrase Peter, the recipient of the request, that is interpreted as the PRO subject of the interpretation.

Speech-act nouns can also select PP-complements that can denote or at least evoke the content of the speech act. The choice of preposition often depends on the speech-act noun.

Postnominal PPs can also refer to the participants of the speech act. The examples in (88) show that the prepositions vanof and aanto are followed by a noun phrase referring to the speaker and the addressee of the speech act, respectively. Note that both the van-PP and the aan-PP precede the propositional om-complement, regardless of whether the latter is a PP or a clause.

The examples in (89) show that a postnominal PP can also have the function of an adverbial adjunct. These examples also show that a PP-complement must precede the PP-adjunct, while a complement clause follows it instead. For more details on the complementation of speech-act nouns, see Section 16.3.

Property nouns are nouns that denote properties of entities. Two basic subtypes can be distinguished: (i) nouns describing physical/perceptible properties of concrete entities, such as hoogteheight, groottesize, vormform, etc., and (ii) nouns describing abstract properties, such as character traits, like geduldpatience or beleefdheidpoliteness. Property nouns, when derived, typically have an adjectival basis: hooghigh, breedwide, grootbig, beleefdpolite, etc. Some property nouns, such as duurduration and kleurcolor have a verbal counterpart (durento last and kleurento color), but whether these nouns are derived from the verbs in question or vice versa is an open question.

Emotion nouns are the last type of abstract nouns to be discussed. These nouns denote (more or less) temporary emotions, like haathatred, begeertedesire, behoefteneed and verdrietgrief. In most cases, the emotion denoted involves some other, affected, entity. In this respect, the nouns show a structural parallelism with the verbs to which they are semantically related; this will be clear from a comparison of the primeless verbal constructions in (94) with the primed nominal ones. However, the fact that these nouns select their own preposition (voor, aan, naar, and tegen/jegens), a phenomenon that is typically absent in the verbal constructions, suggests that these nouns cannot be considered as derived from the related verbs. See Section 16.1, sub VA5, for further discussion of the emotion nouns.