Test 12 · ★ · Swahili Tales, The Nunda: the sultan's cat devours his peo…

Sawa, was the cat ever scared of the sultan?

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: Sawa · What happens: be · To what, where: cat

This is test 12 · ★ of lesson 1795 «Swahili Tales, The Nunda: the sultan's cat devours his people, and his youngest son sets out to slay it» of the books course of Mova's primary school. 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	Sawa	Sawa	PROPN	Number=Sing	5 cat	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	1 Sawa	punct
3	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 cat	cop
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 cat	det
5	cat	cat	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
6	ever	ever	ADV	PronType=Ind	7 scared	advmod
7	scared	scared	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 cat	amod
8	of	of	ADP	_	10 sultan	case
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	10 sultan	det
10	sultan	sultan	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 scared	obl
11	?	?	PUNCT	_	5 cat	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	past	Sawa	the cat					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

Nah, the sultan tried, but failed, fam

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nah	nah	INTJ	_	5 tried	discourse
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	5 tried	punct
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 sultan	det
4	sultan	sultan	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 tried	nsubj
5	tried	try	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	,	,	PUNCT	_	8 failed	punct
7	but	but	CCONJ	_	8 failed	cc
8	failed	fail	VERB	Mood=Ind Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 tried	conj
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	10 fam	punct
10	fam	fam	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 failed	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	try	past	the sultan						vn amuse-31.1 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Experiencer
2	fail	past	the sultan not said here	fam					vn succeed-74-3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent fam=Eventuality

Option 2

Nah, the sultan never even tried to kill it, but he sent his soldiers to the hills to hunt it every day for years.

The tree, 24 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nah	nah	INTJ	_	7 tried	discourse
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	1 Nah	punct
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 sultan	det
4	sultan	sultan	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 tried	nsubj:pass
5	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	7 tried	advmod
6	even	even	ADV	_	7 tried	advmod
7	tried	try	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
8	to	to	PART	_	9 kill	mark
9	kill	kill	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	7 tried	xcomp
10	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	9 kill	obj
11	,	,	PUNCT	_	14 sent	punct
12	but	but	CCONJ	_	14 sent	cc
13	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	14 sent	nsubj
14	sent	send	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 tried	conj
15	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	16 soldiers	nmod:poss
16	soldiers	soldier	NOUN	Number=Plur	14 sent	obj
17	to	to	ADP	_	19 hills	case
18	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	19 hills	det
19	hills	hill	NOUN	Number=Plur	14 sent	obl
20	to	to	PART	_	21 hunt	mark
21	hunt	hunt	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	14 sent	advcl
22	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	21 hunt	obj
23	every	every	DET	PronType=Tot	24 day	det
24	day	day	NOUN	Number=Sing	21 hunt	obl:unmarked
25	for	for	ADP	_	26 years	case
26	years	year	NOUN	Number=Plur	21 hunt	obl
27	.	.	PUNCT	_	7 tried	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	when	roles by
1	not try	participle · passive		the sultan			tree rules
2	kill not said to happen	to-infinitive		sultan			vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme
3	send	past	he	his soldiers	the hills		vn confine-92-1 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent soldier=Theme to hill=Destination
4	hunt	to-infinitive	he not said here	sultan		day; year	vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

Nah, the sultan never even tried to kill it

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nah	nah	INTJ	_	7 tried	discourse
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	1 Nah	punct
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 sultan	det
4	sultan	sultan	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 tried	nsubj:pass
5	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	7 tried	advmod
6	even	even	ADV	_	7 tried	advmod
7	tried	try	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
8	to	to	PART	_	9 kill	mark
9	kill	kill	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	7 tried	xcomp
10	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	9 kill	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not try	participle · passive		the sultan					tree rules
2	kill not said to happen	to-infinitive		sultan					vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme

Option 4 · ← Mova's choice

Yeah, the cat ran from the sultan every time he came near with his soldiers and his spears

The tree, 18 words

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Yeah	yeah	INTJ	_	5 ran	discourse
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	5 ran	punct
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 cat	det
4	cat	cat	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 ran	nsubj
5	ran	run	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	from	from	ADP	_	8 sultan	case
7	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 sultan	det
8	sultan	sultan	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 ran	obl
9	every	every	DET	PronType=Tot	10 time	det
10	time	time	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 came	obl:unmarked
11	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	12 came	nsubj
12	came	come	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 ran	conj
13	near	near	ADV	_	12 came	advmod
14	with	with	ADP	_	16 soldiers	case
15	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	16 soldiers	nmod:poss
16	soldiers	soldier	NOUN	Number=Plur	12 came	obl
17	and	and	CCONJ	_	19 spears	cc
18	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	19 spears	nmod:poss
19	spears	spear	NOUN	Number=Plur	16 soldiers	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	run	past	the cat			the sultan			vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme from sultan=Trajectory
2	come	past	cat				time	with cat's soldiers and cat's spears; near property	vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

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/1795-pg641-part46/t12/