If the primed examples in (610) are indeed ambiguous between a nominal and a verbal reading of the bare infinitive zwemmen, we expect this to come out in the word order of the clause. Since constructions with bare infinitival complement clauses exhibit monoclausal behavior, we expect verb clustering: the verb leren can precede the bare infinitive in embedded clauses and separate it from its dependents (arguments and modifiers). The fact that the verb leren can indeed split the strings goed zwemmenswim well and computers reparerenrepair computers in (611) shows that we are dealing with clausal infinitival complements in these examples, as indicated by labeling the bare infinitive with “V”.

The verbal status of the bare infinitives in the examples from the previous subsection can also be seen from the word order of the clause-final verb sequence. Since noun phrases cannot follow the clause-final verbs, the fact that the bare infinitive follows the clause-final finite verb leren in (611) is sufficient to conclude that we are not dealing with bare-inf nominalizations but with bare infinitival complement clauses. This word-order generalization is especially useful when the verb has no dependent, as in the cases in (612); the bare infinitives following the clause-final finite verb leren must be verbal.

Since bare-inf nominalizations must precede their governing verb in clause-final position, it seems reasonable to assume that the bare infinitives preceding leren are nominal. Nevertheless, we have marked them with a question mark because, although clause-final verb clusters of the form Vfinite - Vinfinitive usually occur with the finite verb preceding the infinitive, most speakers also allow the reverse order under certain conditions; for clear cases illustrating this, see Section 7.3, sub IC.

In the case of no more than two verbs (including the possibly nominalized infinitive), the precedence of the bare infinitive is only a necessary and not a sufficient condition for concluding that we are dealing with a bare-inf nominalization. In the case of more than two verbs, on the other hand, word order can be used as a diagnostic, because in such cases most speakers of standard Dutch require verbal bare infinitives to follow their governing verb. The fact that the bare infinitive zwemmen can precede the verb leren in examples such as (613) thus shows that bare infinitives in the complement of leren can indeed be bare-inf nominalizations, as indicated by the index N on the preverbal occurrence of zwemmen.

The structural ambiguity of the bare infinitives in the primed examples of (610) is also clear from the contrast regarding the IPP-effect in the perfect-tense examples in (614): when leren takes a bare infinitival complement, we expect the IPP-effect to occur, but not when it takes a bare-inf nominalization. The primeless examples show that when the bare infinitive zwemmen follows leren, IPP does indeed occur, and we can therefore conclude that the infinitive is verbal in this case. The primed examples, on the other hand, show that when the bare infinitive zwemmen precedes leren, IPP cannot occur, and we therefore conclude that it is nominal in this case.

In the examples in (614), the difference regarding the IPP-effect was illustrated by the intransitive verb zwemmento swim. The same difference occurs with transitive verbs with a bare nominal object, such as auto rijdento drive a car. Example (615a) shows that the infinitive can either precede or follow its governing verb, while the (b)-examples show that this affects the occurrence of IPP.

Examples such as (615b') work particularly well with bare-inf nominalizations when the object-noun combinations are fixed collocations referring to a conventional activity: aardappels schillento peel potatoes, paard rijdento ride horseback, piano spelento play the piano, etc. Less conventional combinations such as computers reparerento repair computers in (616) seem to be acceptable in bare-inf nominalizations, although some speakers may find them somewhat marked.

That infinitives preceding a clause-final sequence of two (or more) verbs are nominal is also clear from the fact that they need not be adjacent to the clause-final verb sequence; the examples in (617) show that, like other nominal objects, they can scramble to a position further to the left. Note that such examples require the infinitive to have a contrastive accent, and that even then the (b)-example may be considered somewhat marked by some speakers.

Example (618a) shows the same with verbs with a bare nominal object, such as auto rijdento drive. The (b)-examples are added to show that the nominal complement of the bare infinitive can be scrambled on its own by focus movement when the infinitive heads a bare infinitival clause, but that this is impossible when it heads a noun phrase. This is consistent with the fact that the nominal complements are never extracted from bare-inf nominalizations.

Less conventional combinations such as computers reparerento repair computers are again acceptable, but marked as bare-inf nominalizations; this is clear from the fact that focus movement in ?dat Jan computers repareren waarschijnlijk wel nooit zal leren that Jan will probably never learn to repair computers is considered degraded by some speakers.

A final argument for assuming that bare infinitives preceding clause-final sequences of two or more verbs are nominal is that they cannot follow sentence negation expressed by the negative adverb nietnot; as with other indefinite noun phrases, negation must be expressed by the negative article geenno. The contrast between the primeless and primed examples in (619) thus confirms that infinitives preceding a clause-final sequence of two (or more) verbs are nominal in nature.

The examples in (620) illustrate the same contrast in perfect-tense constructions.

The negation facts are less revealing in the case of transitive constructions such as auto rijdento drive, since the indefinite object auto in the verbal construction cannot follow the negative adverb nietnot either, and can also be preceded by the negative article geenno. So, At first glance, the two perfect-tense constructions in (621) seem to behave identically in this case. Note, however, that the article geen is the determiner of the noun phrase geen auto in (621a), but of the whole bare-inf nominalization geen auto rijden in (621b).

The discussion so far has established six differences between constructions with a clausal and a nominal complement in the form of a bare-inf nominalization. These differences are listed in Table (622), repeated from the introduction to Section 5.2.3.

The findings in Table (622) are important because they can help us determine whether a given bare infinitive belongs to the verbal complex or not. The discussion in this section has shown that bare infinitives preceding their governing verb are nominalizations when they occur with two or more verbs. In Chapter 7, we will see that this greatly simplifies the description of the word order of the verbal complex.