Exam question 3 · Old Celtic Romances, The Cave of Cesh Corran: Goll defeats…

Which warrior declined to engage the fourth daughter in combat, and what reason did he give?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: warrior, reason · What happens: decline, not engage, give · To what, where: fourth daughter, combat

This is exam question 3 of lesson 1061 «Old Celtic Romances, The Cave of Cesh Corran: Goll defeats the hags and frees the Fianna» of the books course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Which	which	DET	PronType=Int	2 warrior	det
2	warrior	warrior	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 declined	nsubj
3	declined	decline	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	to	to	PART	_	5 engage	mark
5	engage	engage	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 declined	xcomp
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 daughter	det
7	fourth	fourth	ADJ	Degree=Pos NumForm=Word NumType=Ord	8 daughter	amod
8	daughter	daughter	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 engage	obj
9	in	in	ADP	_	10 combat	case
10	combat	combat	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 engage	obl
11	,	,	PUNCT	_	17 give	punct
12	and	and	CCONJ	_	17 give	cc
13	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	17 give	obj
14	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	17 give	nsubj:outer
15	did	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	17 give	aux
16	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	17 give	nsubj
17	give	give	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 declined	conj
18	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 declined	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	decline	past	which warrior			vn reject-77.2 «NP V S_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Theme
2	not engage	to-infinitive	which warrior not said here	the fourth daughter	in combat goal	vn involve-107.1 «NP V NP PP.goal»: agent=Agent daughter=Theme in combat=Goal
3	give	past · do-support	reason			vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Theme

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

The options

Option 1 · ← Mova's choice

Goll, who declared he was ill

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Goll	Goll	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 declared	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	4 declared	punct
3	who	who	PRON	PronType=Rel	4 declared	nsubj
4	declared	declare	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 ill	nsubj
6	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 ill	cop
7	ill	ill	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 declared	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	declare speech: other	past	Goll						vn declare-29.4-1-1-1 «NP V what S_INF»: agent=Agent
2	is	past	Goll					ill property	tree rules

Option 2

Conan, who declared that he felt too weak

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Conan	Conan	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 declared	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	4 declared	punct
3	who	who	PRON	PronType=Rel	4 declared	nsubj
4	declared	declare	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	that	that	SCONJ	_	7 felt	mark
6	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 felt	nsubj
7	felt	feel	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 declared	advcl
8	too	too	ADV	_	9 weak	advmod
9	weak	weak	ADJ	Degree=Pos	7 felt	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	declare speech: other	past	Conan						vn declare-29.4-1-1-1 «NP V what S_INF»: agent=Agent
2	feel	past	Conan					weak property	vn stimulus_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

Oisi'n, who declared that he felt too weak

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Oisi'n	Oisi'n	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 declared	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	4 declared	punct
3	who	who	PRON	PronType=Rel	4 declared	nsubj
4	declared	declare	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	that	that	SCONJ	_	7 felt	mark
6	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 felt	nsubj
7	felt	feel	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 declared	advcl
8	too	too	ADV	_	9 weak	advmod
9	weak	weak	ADJ	Degree=Pos	7 felt	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	declare speech: other	past	Oisi'n						vn declare-29.4-1-1-1 «NP V what S_INF»: agent=Agent
2	feel	past	Oisi'n					weak property	vn stimulus_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus

Option 4

Oisin, who said he was tired

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Oisin	Oisin	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 said	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	4 said	punct
3	who	who	PRON	PronType=Rel	4 said	nsubj
4	said	say	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 tired	nsubj
6	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 tired	cop
7	tired	tired	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 said	ccomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	say speech: assert	past	Oisin						vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent
2	is	past	Oisin					tired property	tree rules

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

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