Exam question 3 · Russian Folk-Tales, Tsar Novishny, part 9: the children ri…

Why was the serpent unable to pursue the children across the water?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: serpent · What happens: be, pursue · To what, where: children, water

This is exam question 3 of lesson 1103 «Russian Folk-Tales, Tsar Novishny, part 9: the children ride a horse, a humble-bee and a bullock away from the serpent, and the bullock gives his life to save them» 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	Why	why	ADV	PronType=Rel	root	root
2	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	1 Why	cop
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 serpent	det
4	serpent	serpent	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Why	nsubj
5	unable	unable	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 serpent	amod
6	to	to	PART	_	7 pursue	mark
7	pursue	pursue	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	5 unable	xcomp
8	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	9 children	det
9	children	child	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 pursue	obj
10	across	across	ADP	_	12 water	case
11	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 water	det
12	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 pursue	obl
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	1 Why	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	the serpent					why property	tree rules
2	pursue	to-infinitive	the serpent not said here	the children		the water			vn chase-51.6 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent child=Theme across water=Trajectory

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

He had no path to follow

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 had	nsubj
2	had	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	4 path	det
4	path	path	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 had	obj
5	to	to	PART	_	6 follow	mark
6	follow	follow	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 path	acl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	have	past	He	no path					vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent path=Patient
2	follow	to-infinitive	He not said here	no path not said here					vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice

He lacked any ground upon which to run and the water stopped him

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 lacked	nsubj
2	lacked	lack	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	any	any	DET	PronType=Ind	4 ground	det
4	ground	ground	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 lacked	obj
5	upon	upon	ADP	_	6 which	case
6	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	2 lacked	obj
7	to	to	PART	_	8 run	mark
8	run	run	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 lacked	advcl
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	12 stopped	cc
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 water	det
11	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 stopped	nsubj
12	stopped	stop	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	2 lacked	conj
13	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	12 stopped	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	lack	past	He	any ground	tree rules
2	run	to-infinitive	He not said here		vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
3	stop	past	the water	him = he	vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: agent=Subeventuality he=Eventuality

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

He lacked any ground upon which to run

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 lacked	nsubj
2	lacked	lack	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	any	any	DET	PronType=Ind	4 ground	det
4	ground	ground	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 lacked	obj
5	upon	upon	ADP	_	6 which	case
6	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	2 lacked	obj
7	to	to	PART	_	8 run	mark
8	run	run	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 lacked	advcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	lack	past	He	any ground					tree rules
2	run	to-infinitive	He not said here						vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 4

The water was too deep for him

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 water	det
2	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 deep	nsubj
3	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 deep	cop
4	too	too	ADV	_	5 deep	advmod
5	deep	deep	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
6	for	for	ADP	_	7 him	case
7	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 deep	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	the water					for him = he; deep 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.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/books/1103-pg29672-part9/e3/