Part of Chapter 14: Verb Phrases in English (Based on Norman C. Stageberg, An Introductory English Grammar, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1981) A. What is a Verb Phrase? Like a noun phrase, a verb phrase consists of a verb and all the words and word groups that belong with the verb and cluster around it. The verb is called the headword or head, and the other words are the modifiers (as in the case of the noun phrase) and the auxiliaries, and complements of the verb. The word auxiliaries may be familiar to you since you have studied this structure class in your morphology course. As for the word complements, it is a generic (or general) term which covers all completers of the verb. These complements are the direct object, the indirect object, the objective complement, and the subjective complement, all of which we shall know about later in the present book. B. Examples of Verb Phrases 1. soon arrived 2. arrived late 3. soon arrived at the station where in example 1. we have a modifier soon preceding the head; in example 2, a modifier late following the head ; and in example 3, we have two modifiers, one preceding (soon) and one following (in the station). In 4. had been eaten by the cat, and 5. built a house we have an example of auxiliaries (had been) and an example of a complement of the direct object type (a house). C. English Sentences Many English sentences consist of two parts, a noun phrase and a verb phrase. For example, the sentence Many students attended the birthday party is composed of the noun phrase many students and the verb phrase attended the birthday party.