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This article argues for the existence of obligatory clausal DP shells: a structure in which an embedded CP is directly dominated by a projection of D. While this structure has been proposed in previous literature, it poses a theoretical problem, since according to one theory of well‐formed extended projections, a D head can only occur in the extended projection of a noun (Grimshaw). A careful investigation of embedded clauses in Ndebele—verb‐complement, noun‐complement, and relative clauses—points to the conclusion that the grammar must allow base generation of direct clausal DP shells. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]