2.1 Abney (1987)

The empirical challenge that leads Abney (1987) to posit a DP is the dual behavior of the verbal gerund (what he calls the poss-ing gerund) in (1) and (4), which combines nominal behavior — evidenced by the possessive external argument John’s — and verbal behavior — evidenced by accusative case marking, use of the auxiliary and averbial modification. In particular, the principles of the evolving X-bar theory promoted in Chomsky (1970) disallow an exocentric structure with mixed nominal and verbal projections as in (6), which represents the straighforward make-up of the verbal gerund in (4) with NP standing for John’s and VP_ing for (quickly) refusing the offer or having (quickly) refused the offer.

Abney proposes a complex structure for the nominal phrase, in which D may select a VP or an NP. The exact implementation is not trivial, as shown by the many options he discusses. His final account for the verbal and the nominal gerund (his poss-ing vs. ing-of) is given in (7) and (8) (Abney 1987: 223).² Both are nominalized by the suffix -ing, which attaches to VP and V, respectively, and turns their feature specification from [–N] to [+N]. Needless to say, the syntactic status of -ing is peculiar, as it “affixes to a verbal projection, converting it directly into a nominal projection, without projecting any structure of its own” (Abney 1987: 224).

(7)	John’s singing the Marseillaise (poss-ing)

(8)	John’s singing of the Marseillaise (ing-of)

2.2 Nominalization with or without NP/nP

Building on Chomsky (1970), syntactic frameworks of word formation like Distributed Morphology (Marantz 1997; Harley & Noyer 2000; Alexiadou 2001; Arad 2005; Marantz 2007) and the Exo-Skeletal Model (Borer 2005; 2013) assume acategorial roots, which must combine with functional heads to build words. When a root combines with such a head, it becomes categorized as a noun, verb or adjective, a fact that stays implicit, for instance, in Marantz (1997) or is specifically implemented by means of a functional non-lexical head as in Alexiadou (2001: 19).

Borer (2005; 2013) and De Belder (2011) explicitly argue against ‘lexical’ categorizers and employ functors to indirectly categorize roots. For nominalizations as in (9a,b), Borer (2013) takes the suffixes -ion and -ing to represent different functors of some type C_N[V], which turn a structure of category V into a nominal as in (9c) — a simplified abstraction of her structure (134a) (Borer 2013: 179): DP1 stands for the court and DP2 for the crime.³ The other option is for D itself (or another extended projection) to nominalize a root as in zero-derived nominals. In (10), a root like √WALK may be turned into a noun or a verb by some nominal or verbal extended projection represented by D and T (Borer 2013: 324). There is therefore nominalization of verbs by functors introduced by suffixes or simple nominalization/categorization of roots by D (or another head of the nominal extended projection).

Marantz (2007; 2013) argues that lexical categorizers such as n(oun)/v(erb)/a(djective) play a crucial role in word formation as phase heads that define the level where idiosyncratic meaning is negotiated between functional categories and roots; everything above them must receive compositional interpretation.⁴ Most of the following work in DM assumes the presence of lexical categorizers in word formation, which categorize roots in a syntactic derivation (Arad 2005; Embick & Marantz 2008; Embick 2010; Panagiotidis 2011; 2014).

Panagiotidis (2011; 2014) fine-tunes this approach by arguing that lexical categorizers like n and v are necessary for interpreting roots: they have LF-interpretable [N]/[V] features and provide the interpretive perspective for semantically deficient roots. Much in the spirit of Abney (1987), Panagiotidis argues that non-lexical functional heads like D lack descriptive content and cannot categorize the underspecified semantics of roots (Baker 2003).

To account for mixed projections, Panagiotidis (2014: Section 6.5) posits a special functional (vs. lexical) categorizer — a switch, as he calls it —, which bears both interpretable (i.e., lexical) and uninterpretable (i.e., functional) categorial features, and mediates between nominal and verbal projections. For verbal gerunds as in (1)/(4), the switch is Ger(und) and has an interpretable [N] and an uninterpretable [uV] feature. The former allows Ger to appear with a possessive determiner, whose [uN] it agrees with as in (11) (Panagiotidis 2014: 145); the latter is eliminated via categorial Agree with the embedded verbal structure, similarly to the [uV] feature of Aspect.

I will not go into further details of Panagiotidis’s analysis or a comparison to other proposals (see Section 6.1) but simply point out that (11) fails to account for the contrast in (2). In particular, if the functional categorizer Ger has an interpretable feature [N], nothing can explain why this feature would value the [uN] feature of the possessive D as in (11) but not that of the other English determiners in (2b). I will return to this point in Section 4.

(11)	Albert’s eating herring

2.3 Interim conclusions

Two interrelated aspects in the previous literature are relevant for the present paper: an appropriate treatment of the two types of nominalization and the status of the DP and the NP in a theory of word formation. For the latter aspect, we find two trends. On the one hand, Abney employs the DP in order to expand the structure of the noun phrase and to accommodate mixed projections like the verbal gerund. On the other hand, current trends in syntactic theories of word formation aim to dispense with lexical categorizers like n and posit categorization (of roots) via extended projections like D.

To approach the different types of nominalization, various additional categorizers are promoted. Borer (2013) uses deverbal nominalizing C_N[V] functors such as the nominalizing suffixes -ing or -ation, as well as nominal extended projections (including D) to nominalize a structure. Panagiotidis (2014) posits a functional categorizer Ger for the verbal gerund, which substantially differs from the lexical categorizer n contributed by nominalizing suffixes. For Panagiotidis, both types of nominalization project DP.

I will show that the current apparatus available in nominal syntax, which includes both N and D with their corresponding features and properties, is necessary and sufficient for a straighforward implementation of the empirical contrast in (2), without further functors or special categorizers. Arguably, the role that N/n plays in my account could be carried out by another nominal projection like Classifier, which would carry the same features that I attribute to N/n, in models as in Borer (2013); De Belder (2011). However, the presence of the D-layer is crucial, unless we want to argue that lexical determiners are ambiguous between instantiating D, N, and/or a special categorizer like Panagiotidis’s switch, which would be undesirable.

3.1 Adjectival modification

The essential property of nominalizations that flexibly allow determiners is their compatibility with adjectives, which indicates a nominal internal syntax (Iordăchioaia 2014). In (4b) and (5) we saw that derived nominals in English pattern this way, while the verbal gerund does not. The nominal gerund (or ing-of) in (13) behaves like a full nominalization. The same contrast is visible for Romanian in (12) and for Spanish in (14): the full nominalization can be modified by adjectives, while the defective one requires adverbs.

In confirmation of the correlation between determiner selection and adjectival modification, the German minimal pair in (15) (Iordăchioaia 2014: 183) shows that, when modified by an adjective as in (15a), an infinitival nominalization may also combine with any determiner; however, when modified by an adverb as in (15b), it is only compatible with the definite determiner das, as in Spanish and Romanian. (15a) patterns with full nominalizations and (15b) with defective ones.

3.2 Nominal features

Adjectival modification indicates that full nominalizations have nominal internal syntax. More support comes from properties that show that these nominalizations have gender features. Although in Spanish and Romanian both full and defective nominalizations exhibit morphological gender, I will argue that only the former have valued gender features; the latter receive a default value like CPs.

For Romanian, Iordăchioaia & Soare (2008) argue that the feminine form of the infinitival nominalization represents valued gender, while the neuter form of the supine is a default specification similar to that of CPs. In (16a), the CP is felicitously referred back to by the default gendered anaphor asta, but not by aceasta or acesta, which bear valued feminine and masculine-neuter features. The infinitive nominalization in (16b) contrasts with the CP in being compatible with aceasta, as its suffix is inherently feminine. The supine in (16c), however, disallows the anaphor acesta, which carries valued masculine-neuter gender, and allows instead the default gender anaphor asta, patterning with the CP, which lacks nominal internal features altogether.

Plann (1981) and Miguel (1996) argue for a similar difference between the nominal and the verbal infinitive nominalization in Spanish. (17a) indicates that the nominal infinitive has full gender features like the masculine pronoun él, while (17b) shows that the more verbal infinitive has default gender like the neuter pronoun ello (see also Alexiadou et al. 2011 for German).

Besides gender features, Iordăchioaia & Soare (2008) argue that the two patterns of nominalization in Romanian also contrast in availability of number features and case declension. The conclusion is that, in conformity with the hypothesis that full nominalizations exhibit entirely nominal syntax, they also present evidence of valued nominal features in languages in which these are visible (see (16b) and (17a)). In contrast to these, defective nominalizations are not nominal internally, since they pattern with CPs in receiving default gender values in contexts such as in (16c) and (17b).

5.1 Between TP and AspectP

As observed in Section 3, the defective nominalizations in the languages addressed here exhibit different degrees of verbiness and could be argued to form a scale from least to most verbal nominalized structures (Alexiadou et al. 2011). The Spanish verbal infinitive is very high up on the verbal scale: besides disallowing adjectives (like all defective nominals; see (14b)), it realizes auxiliaries and its internal and external arguments bear accusative and nominative case, respectively (see (3b)). These properties suggest the presence of a TP layer, which ensures the same structural case assignment as in full sentences. In confirmation of a TP, the Spanish verbal infinitive allows clitics in (22a) (Plann 1981), which are typically hosted by TP. By contrast, its more nominal version with genitive case on the internal argument cannot host the clitic: cf. (22b)–(22c) (Pesetsky & Torrego 2002).

The Romanian supine has the smallest verbal structure: only its incompatibility with adjectives and the restricted compatibility with determiners make it a defective nominalization. Cornilescu (2001) argues that the supine involves a form of atelic aspectual value, an observation that Iordăchioaia & Soare (2008) further refine by showing that the supine nominalization carries a pluractional operator (over events), which makes it similar to imperfective aspect and requires grammatical AspectP in its structure. This projection is also syntactically confirmed by the ability of the supine to incorporate the aspectual particle mai ‘anymore’ in (23a) (Alboiu 2002). Unlike the Spanish verbal infinitive, the supine cannot host clitics in (23b). Following Iordăchioaia & Soare (2008), the supine represents a nominalized AspectP structure as in (24b), where PO stands for ‘pluractional operator’ and VoiceP introduces the external argument.

5.2 The English verbal gerund (poss-ing)

The English verbal gerund (or poss-ing) has generated an unsolved controversy. Previous approaches vary between proposing that it projects up to VoiceP/vP (Moulton 2004), AspectP (Siegel 1998; Wiltschko 2014) or TP (Johnson 1988). Panagiotidis (2014) follows Siegel (1998) and takes it to embed an AspectP, as in (11). Moulton (2004) inspects the realization of external arguments and argues that it is a nominalization of a vP, where v stands for the head introducing the external argument, which I take here to be Voice (Kratzer 1996; Alexiadou et al. 2015). A confounding factor in some earlier approaches is that they try to unify all the varieties of the gerund under the same construction, although they differ in many ways (Siegel 1998; Pires 2006; Lowe 2019). In addition, the VP in (7) (Abney 1987) may correspond to several projections in current theory: vP/VoiceP (Moulton 2004), AspectP (Siegel 1998; Panagiotidis 2014) and possibly more. Below I argue that the verbal gerund projects up to TP.

Pires (2006) argues that the acc-ing gerund embeds a TP projection, which the poss-ing allegedly cannot do. This is supported by the former’s compatibility with sentential adverbs in (25a) and there-insertion in (25b), where the poss-ing is excluded (Pires 2006: 18). Given that DPs normally disallow there-insertion (see (25c) from Moulton 2004: 132), Pires concludes that acc-ing cannot be a DP. The lack of a DP in acc-ing brings it closer to to-infinitives, contra Abney (1987) and other previous approaches, which assume a DP for all gerunds that appear in case positions.

I will argue that Pires’s contrast between acc-ing and poss-ing in that only the latter involves a DP explains their difference in subject realization, but they actually both embed a TP (see Lowe 2019 for a similar LFG-approach). First, following Cinque (1999), probably does not modify T but epistemic Mood, which is right above T (past) in his functional hierarchy. The adverb once, however, modifies T(past) and it can appear with the poss-ing gerund as in (26) (from the enTenTen15 web corpus at https://www.sketchengine.eu/).

Second, and more importantly, just like acc-ing in (27a) and (27b) (Pires 2006), poss-ing bears tense specification, as shown by its compatibility with temporal adverbs different from those of the main clause in (27c) and (27d).

The data in (26) and (27) clearly indicate that poss-ing nominalizations include a TP, like the Spanish verbal infinitive. The latter seems to also host Mood-modifiers like probably as in (28), which indicates that it may be slightly more complex than the verbal gerund in English.

Siegel (1998) and Moulton (2004), who propose lower verbal structures for the verbal gerund, did not investigate its properties in (26)–(27) beyond data as in (25a). Moulton’s argument that it must include a projection for the external argument is straightforward, since VoiceP is below Aspect. I will demonstrate, though, that -ing in the verbal gerund does not instantiate Aspect, as claimed by Siegel (1998) and Panagiotidis (2014). First, as Zucchi (1993) and Siegel (1998) show, the verbal gerund cannot denote events (see (29a)). The Romanian supine, whose highest verbal projection is AspectP, can denote events (see (29b) from Iordăchioaia & Soare 2015). This shows that the verbal gerund must be more complex than AspectP (Zucchi 1993).

Second, the verbal gerund -ing is compatible with stative verbs in (30b), which indicates that it does not have any grammatical aspect meaning that would conflict with the lexical aspect of the base verb. This is indeed the case with progressive -ing realizing Aspect, which is incompatible with stative verbs (see (30a)). As Iordăchioaia & Soare (2015) show, the Romanian supine is also sensitive to the lexical aspect of the base verb and incompatible with states in (30c), which is explained by its carrying pluractional Aspect.

Having shown that the verbal gerund presents properties indicative of TP and that its suffix -ing does not realize Aspect, I propose that -ing realizes a nonfinite tense form like to-infinitives under T. The verbal gerund receives the structure in (31) and the Spanish verbal infinitive that in (32b).

Two clarifications are in order here. First, one may have reservations about the multi-functionality of verbal -ing between T and Aspect. However, this is not unusual for this suffix in the history of English. It is well known that at the origin of the progressive and the gerund is a full nominalization similar to the present-day nominal gerund, which in time developed verbal properties (Alexiadou 2013; Iordăchioaia & Werner 2019). Alexiadou argues that -ing acquires (more and more) verbal traits in its historical development, which can be viewed on a scale of grammaticalization in the verbal functional domain. As a deverbal derivational suffix, -ing first exhibited lexical aspectual properties in the competition with other nominalizations (see the nominal gerund in Iordăchioaia & Werner 2019; cf. Borer 2013), which then led to expressing progressive grammatical aspect with verbs. It is conceivable that -ing may have undergone one further step of grammaticalization and come to also contribute nonfinite tense in gerundive contexts (see van Gelderen 2018: Chapter 9 and references therein on parallel examples of grammaticalization from lexical into grammatical aspect and eventually into tense marking).

Second, the question arises as to why the verbal gerund in English does not license nominative case like the Spanish verbal infinitive. There are several aspects to consider here. First, as I have shown, the Spanish infinitive is more complex than the English verbal gerund, in that it licenses Mood-modifiers as in (28). Second, English has another gerund construction that (possibly) exhibits nominative (besides accusative) subjects like the Spanish infinitive: it is the acc-ing gerund in (25a)–(25b), which also allows Mood-modifiers. We may be tempted to conclude that the English correlate of the Spanish verbal infinitive is acc-ing. This picture is complicated, however, by an important difference between the Spanish verbal infinitive and the English acc-ing. Pires (2006) convincingly argues that acc-ing lacks a DP layer and, for this reason, its T carries the unvalued Case feature that a D normally would. To value the Case feature of its subject, the T head of acc-ing is bound to first value its own Case feature in the matrix clause (see distributional evidence in Pires 2006: 52–55).⁷ By contrast, the Spanish verbal infinitive has a DP, which will value its Case feature in the matrix clause without any influence on the T head. Unlike in the acc-ing, the T head of the Spanish infinitive has a valued Case feature which can value the unvalued Case of its subject with a nominative form.

In conclusion, the T head of the English gerund (whether poss-ing or acc-ing) cannot value the Case feature of its subject, similarly to T in to-infinitives.⁸ This leads to two versions of the gerund. One is the acc-ing, which lacks a DP and carries an unvalued Case feature on T. This Case feature needs to be valued by the matrix T for it to then also value the Case feature of the subject. The other version is the poss-ing/verbal gerund in (31), which realizes a DP layer (see also Lowe 2019). Its D carries an unvalued Case feature that will be valued by the matrix T, but it also carries a valued genitive/possessive Case feature, which will value the Case feature of its subject in SpecDP. The EPP feature of its T head will be valued by its subject, which, however, will move further to SpecDP to value its Case feature, since the T head of poss-ing has no Case feature. The impossibility of the poss-ing gerund to realize an expletive subject, as in (25b), is due to the latter’s Case being valued in SpecDP, a position that bans expletives (see discussion in Moulton 2004).

5.3 Can AspectP be nominalized by n?

In our investigation of defective nominalizations, we saw two instances that are (at least) as high as TP (the Spanish verbal infinitive and the English verbal gerund) and one that has been argued to be as low as (grammatical) AspectP (namely, the Romanian supine). Since we want to know which verbal layer prevents nominalization by n so that only D can attach to it, the question is whether it must be AspectP or TP. Polish nominalizations, which also realize AspectP, indicate that n can nominalize AspectP.

Based on the aspectual parallelism with the verbal constructions in (33), Alexiadou et al. (2010) argue that the corresponding Polish nie-nominals in (34) project AspecP: perfective verbs and nominalizations are both compatible with in- but not with for-adverbials. Furthermore, (35) shows that both perfective and imperfective nie-nominals denote events.

In these respects, Polish nie-nominalizations are similar to the Romanian supine. Yet, unlike the latter, they prefer adjectival modification. Adverbs are not entirely excluded, as (36b) illustrates, but adjectives are better.⁹

Alexiadou et al. (2010: 565) analyze these nominalizations as projecting AspectP and being nominalized by n followed by further nominal projections (i.e., Classifier and, possibly, Number for perfective nominals) as in (37), where their VP equals our VoiceP with full argument structure.

Polish nominalizations indicate that crosslinguistically we do find cases of AspectP nominalized by n, and not all such structures must be nominalized by D as in the Romanian supine. Following this last piece of evidence, we can conclude that AspectP is the level at which nominalization by both n and D can apply, a matter to be decided by further linguistic factors.

5.4 TP must be nominalized by D

The behavior of defective nominalizations in English, Spanish, and Romanian has shown us that the level at which nominalization by n is not possible anymore is TP. Intuitively, TP is reasonably high on the verbal scale as not to allow a lexical categorizer, especially if D is indeed the nominal counterpart of C, following the tradition of Abney (1987): D or C could come above T, but nothing lower than D should (cf. Wiltschko’s 2014 universal domains). More precisely, vP traditionally represents the ‘lexical’, and TP the functional domain. AspectP is in between and predictably should lend itself to either of the two domains, which is exactly what we find in nominalizations: AspectP directly combines with the functional nominalizer D in the Romanian supine, but with the lexical n in Polish nominalizations with the suffix -nie.

Further study is needed to determine how the lexical categorizer n is technically prevented from attaching on top of functional TP. It may be that lexical categorizers (as standard derivational suffixes) need to Agree with their embedded structure either by imposing their lexically valued features onto an acategorial root (the basic case; cf. Kramer 2015: Section 3.4) or via some feature congruence, as argued for the Aspect-Classifier countability mapping in Alexiadou et al. (2010), who show that, e.g., in Polish, only perfective nominalizations are countable and allow plural, while the imperfective ones behave like mass nouns. Arguably, this cross-categorial interaction may proceed via the feature specification of nP, Aspect, TP, and DP. If Aspect (but not T) carries phi-features, as the verbal correspondent of nominal Number (see Wiltschko 2014), it may get these valued by n. However, T values Case features, which are carried by D, not by n. Case feature valuation can proceed between TP and DP, but there is no feature valuation possible between TP and n, since the former has no phi-features, and the latter no Case feature for the other to value. Agreement between nP and TP is thus impossible, since the two projections share no features.

6.1 Mixed categories in nominalization

My analysis of mixed projections in nominalization comes in a long series of approaches, to which I cannot do justice here.¹⁰ However, I would like to address some recent typological ideas and show how they resonate with the contrast between nominalization by D and by n. Following the insightful observation in Borsley & Kornfilt (2000) that mixed categories are organized in two well-defined categorial domains which cannot intermingle (e.g., low verbal and high nominal structure in deverbal nominalization), an important research question pursued in the literature has been, what amount of structure can be preserved from the original category? A broad variety of nominalization patterns have been identified across and within individual languages (Alexiadou et al. 2010; 2011; Kornfilt & Whitman 2011). Kornfilt & Whitman (2011), in particular, present four types of nominalization hosting a CP, a TP, a VoiceP (i.e., their vP) or a vP (i.e., their VP).

CP-nominalizations involve full clauses with overt complementizers, as shown for Spanish in (38) from Plann (1981) (see also Polish in Section 6.2).

Under TP-nominalizations Kornfilt & Whitman (2011) analyze Turkish nominalizations with overt [±realis] morphology. They argue, however, that this T head is defective, as it fails to license nominative subjects, which reminds us of the English poss-ing gerund in Section 5.2. Interestingly, Kornfilt and Whitman also take the poss-ing to include a TP, but for reasons different from the ones presented above. Their evidence is the presence of what they call a [+realis] value, which they use to explain the fact that the poss-ing in (39a) bears a cancelable presupposition that Kim finished the sonata, which is absent in the acc-ing gerund in (39b).

VoiceP- (or their vP-) nominalizations are illustrated by Italian infinitives as in (40) from Zucchi (1993), which license accusative objects.

Kornfilt & Whitman (2011) follow the standard assumption that accusative case is licensed by VoiceP/vP (cf. Wiltschko 2014: 76, where AspectP is responsible for accusative case). However, we saw in (24) that the Romanian supine includes a VoiceP (see Iordăchioaia 2008 for concrete evidence) next to AspectP, but realizes its object in the genitive. Moreover, the English nominal/ing-of gerund has also been argued to project VoiceP, given that it excludes self-action interpretation, similarly to the verbal passive: see (41) from Kratzer (2002: Chapter 1) (see also Alexiadou et al. 2009). The only interpretation available for (41) is that somebody else dresses the children, which indicates that a covert external argument is licensed in VoiceP. This means that VoiceP (or even AspectP) does not impose accusative on objects in nominalizations, since genitive objects are possible, as well.¹¹

A question that arises now with respect to (40) is whether these infinitives are not more complex than just VoiceP — possibly as high as TP, as argued here for poss-ing. Counterevidence for this comes from their compatibility with adjectives (besides adverbs). In my approach, infinitives as in (40) must include an nP to allow for adjectival modifiers, which in turn suggests that their structure cannot be as high as TP, since this would exclude an nP. Thus, the infinitive in (40) may be as high as AspectP or just VoiceP, as Kornfilt & Whitman (2011) analyze it.

In Kornfilt and Whitman’s approach, vP- (or their VP-) nominalizations include all the other deverbal nominals that realize objects with genitive case and exhibit no indication of VoiceP (their vP). This includes the full nominalization patterns in Section 3 and Chomsky’s (1970) derived nominals.

Kornfilt & Whitman (2011) do not go to great lengths on the nominal structure above CP/TP/VoiceP/vP and do not address the determiner restriction in (2). However, their assumptions are similar to mine, in that they take adjectival modification in (40) to indicate the presence of nominal structure lower than DP and analyze CP-nominalizations as involving only a D head above the CP. The former idea relates to my nominalization by n, and the latter to my nominalization by D. In conclusion, the typology in Kornfilt & Whitman (2011) is fully compatible with the distinction between nominalization by D vs. by n: their CP- and TP-nominalizations map under my defective nominalizations by D, and their vP- and VP-nominalizations are accounted for under my nominalization by n.

6.2 The NP-DP debate

One last point I would like to address concerns the predictions of my two posited nominalization processes for the NP-DP debate in nominal syntax. Bošković (2005) (and subsequent work) argues for a so-called NP/DP parameter that predicts crucial structural differences between languages with articles, which project a DP, and languages without articles, which are argued to project no DP, but only an NP. This idea is later supported, but also seriously challenged in other approaches (Caruso 2012; Kornfilt 2018).

The languages discussed in Section 3 all have articles, and my proposal of two nominalization patterns by n and by D raises the question of what nominalizations might tell about the NP/DP parameter claim: do they support or challenge it? If languages were indeed split between realizing and lacking a DP, depending on the (un)availability of articles, as Bošković argues, we would expect nominalization by D not to be available in articleless languages — a nominalizing suffix would always be required. If we find, however, such nominalizations, they would support the competing analyses, which posit a DP also in languages that do not have overt articles.

In Section 5.3, we briefly addressed Polish nominalizations, which realize overt aspectual markers and project AspectP. Polish is an articleless language that Bošković includes in the class of languages that lack a DP. The nominalizations presented in Section 5.3 all involve the nominalizing suffix -nie and project nP. However, Borsley & Kornfilt (2000) and Kornfilt & Whitman (2011) show that Polish exhibits CP-nominalizations as in (42) (see also Miechowicz-Mathiasen 2012; Bondaruk 2014).

Borsley & Kornfilt (2000) and Kornfilt & Whitman (2011) convincingly argue that, like similar constructions in Greek, the Polish to+CP sequence represents one constituent and not two as in English it+CP in (43a): the nominalization to+CP may be fronted in (42b) and can appear as a sentence fragment in (42b), unlike it+CP in (43b)–(43c).

The data in (42) indicate that Polish indeed can employ the demonstrative to ‘this’ as a determiner to nominalize a full CP, similarly to the definite article el in Spanish (38) — another case of nominalization by D.¹² This is in line with the literature that argues against Bošković’s NP/DP parameter and posits a DP layer even in articleless languages, which is often lexicalized by demonstratives or some numerals (Caruso 2012).