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The main uses of the various nonfinite verb forms (infinitives, participles and gerunds) are described in the following sections. For how these forms are made, see § Inflected forms of verbs above. For more information on distinguishing between the various uses that use the form in -ing, see -ing: Uses.
Gerunds were formed using to followed by a verbal noun in the dative case, which ended in -anne or -enne (e.g., tō cumenne = "coming, to come"). [2] In Middle English, the bare infinitive and the gerund coalesced into the same form ending in -(e)n (e.g., comen "come"; to comen "to come"). The "to" infinitive was not split in Old or Early ...
These verbs are called "catenative" because of their ability to form chains in catenative constructions. For example: We need to go to the tennis court to help Jim to get some practice before the game. "Need" is used here as a catenative verb followed by the infinitive "to go", and "help" is a catenative verb followed by the infinitive "to get".
The term gerund is applied to clauses similar to [4a] and [4b]. In [6a] and [6b] coming is related to the participle use as an adverbial. in [5a] and [5b] the verbs kept and coming refer to the same event. Coming is related to the progressive aspect use in She is coming.
Most verbs have three or four inflected forms in addition to the base form: a third-person singular present tense form in -(e)s (writes, botches), a present participle and gerund form in -ing (writing), a past tense (wrote), and – though often identical to the past tense form – a past participle (written).
Infinitive phrases often have an implied grammatical subject making them effectively clauses rather than phrases. Such infinitive clauses or infinitival clauses, are one of several kinds of non-finite clause. They can play various grammatical roles like a constituent of a larger clause or sentence; for example it may form a noun phrase or ...
The past participle is been, which is pronounced with an /ɪ/ sound in US English, and the present participle and gerund forms are regular: being. For more details see Indo-European copula . As mentioned above, apart from its other irregularities, the verb do , which is pronounced with an /u/ sound, has the third person present indicative does ...
An example of a verbal noun in English is 'sacking' as in the sentence "The sacking of the city was an epochal event" (wherein sacking is a gerund form of the verb sack). A verbal noun, as a type of nonfinite verb form, is a term that some grammarians still use when referring to gerunds, gerundives, supines, and nominal forms of infinitives.