Integrated parentheticals and assertional complements

German has three different kinds of verb-first integrated parentheticals (VIPs), which differ from other kinds of parentheticals in several respects: (i) VIPs have verb-first order; (ii) they form one focus-background-structure with their host; (iii) the proposition expressed by the host is linked to the implicit propositional argument of the parenthetical predicate; (iv) VIP-constructions are hybrid structures with two clauses mutually depending on each other, and (v) declarative VIP-constructions are subject to embedded root restrictions. In this paper, I argue that non-canonical licensing is the basic property of all three kinds of VIPs. Especially property (v) provides an argument against analyses assuming canonical argument linking and topic-drop in declarative VIPs. As a consequence, declarative VIPs turn out to be genuine verb-first structures.