Exam question 4 · Celtic Fairy Tales, Ian the Fisher's Son, part 27: Ian is…

To what circumstance were the robbers' quarrel and subsequent fighting attributed?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · What happens: be, attribute · To what, where: quarrel, subsequent fighting

This is exam question 4 of lesson 1302 «Celtic Fairy Tales, Ian the Fisher's Son, part 27: Ian is killed and revived by the deer, then the birds carry him under the sea» 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	To	to	ADP	_	2 what	case
2	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	8 quarrel	nsubj
3	circumstance	circumstance	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 what	nsubj
4	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	8 quarrel	cop
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 robbers	det
6	robbers	robber	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 quarrel	nmod:poss
7	'	's	PART	_	6 robbers	case
8	quarrel	quarrel	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	11 fighting	cc
10	subsequent	subsequent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 fighting	amod
11	fighting	fighting	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 quarrel	conj
12	attributed	attribute	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	11 fighting	acl
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	8 quarrel	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	past		the robbers's quarrel and subsequent fighting					tree rules
2	attribute	participle		subsequent fighting not said here					tree rules

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

The complete exhaustion of all their food supplies and their ale

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 exhaustion	det
2	complete	complete	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 exhaustion	amod
3	exhaustion	exhaustion	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
4	of	of	ADP	_	8 supplies	case
5	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	8 supplies	det:predet
6	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	8 supplies	nmod:poss
7	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 supplies	compound
8	supplies	supplies	NOUN	Number=Ptan	3 exhaustion	nmod
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	11 ale	cc
10	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	11 ale	nmod:poss
11	ale	ale	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 supplies	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	exhaust			their food supplies and supplies's ale					nom exhaustion «state transitive»: of=patient

Option 2

The shortage of their wine casks

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 shortage	det
2	shortage	shortage	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	of	of	ADP	_	6 casks	case
4	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	6 casks	nmod:poss
5	wine	wine	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 casks	compound
6	casks	cask	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 shortage	nmod

The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.

Option 3

A quarrel over the stolen gold

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	A	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	2 quarrel	det
2	quarrel	quarrel	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	over	over	ADP	_	6 gold	case
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 gold	det
5	stolen	steal	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	6 gold	amod
6	gold	gold	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 quarrel	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	steal	participle							vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

The exhaustion of their food supplies

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 exhaustion	det
2	exhaustion	exhaustion	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
3	of	of	ADP	_	6 supplies	case
4	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	6 supplies	nmod:poss
5	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 supplies	compound
6	supplies	supplies	NOUN	Number=Ptan	2 exhaustion	nmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	exhaust			their food supplies					nom exhaustion «state transitive»: of=patient

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/1302-pg3454-part27/e4/