 The verbal bracket or brace in German, Zatzklammer, is a typical feature of the Germanic languages. It allows the separation of parts of the verb group and the insertion of all sorts of material in between. In main clauses, this brace construction occurs only in complex verb groups, where the finite verb is separated from the non-finite verbal elements. These, together, form an imaginary kind of bracket or brace around other sentence constituents. Here are some examples in present-day English. In John Has Read and John Might Have Read the book, we can construct a verbal bracket, for example one that contains a negative particle and an adverb. The object by contrast cannot become part of the brace. In the German equivalent sentences, all complex verb groups exhibit a bracket and as you can see here, the material inside the bracket may even include the object and its size is theoretically unrestricted. In German subordinate clauses with an SOV word order, the term verbal bracket has been extended to include the initial subordinating conjunction and all clause final verbal elements and its length, again, can be theoretically unrestricted. In English, the term verbal bracket is used for verbal elements only.