[aleph_minus_one]

> I spent quite some time thinking it had something to do with German’s sometimes-SOV word order.

If you refer to subclauses in the German language: here the rule is rather "the finite verb is at the end of the subclause".

[yorwba]

It also applies to infitives and participles and the verb in nominalized noun-verb compounds. So the rule is closer to "the verb is at the end of its grammatical unit, except for the finite verb in a main clause, which appears in second position." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V2_word_order

[kaladin-jasnah]

I think this is also called V2 word order.

[aleph_minus_one]

V2 word order (finite verb comes second) is what is used in main clauses.