Exam question 4 · Household Tales, The Golden Bird, part 71: the Prince fail…

State the reason the youngest Prince was originally denied permission to undertake the journey in quest of the thief.

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: thief · What happens: deny, undertake, quest · To what, where: State reason, journey, quest

This is exam question 4 of lesson 1934 «Household Tales, The Golden Bird, part 71: the Prince fails to steal the golden horse and is caught» 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	State	state	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 reason	compound
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 reason	det
3	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 denied	nsubj:pass
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 Prince	det
5	youngest	young	ADJ	Degree=Sup	6 Prince	amod
6	Prince	Prince	PROPN	Number=Sing	3 reason	appos
7	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	9 denied	aux:pass
8	originally	originally	ADV	_	9 denied	advmod
9	denied	deny	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
10	permission	permission	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 denied	obj
11	to	to	PART	_	12 undertake	mark
12	undertake	undertake	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	10 permission	acl
13	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	14 journey	det
14	journey	journey	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 undertake	obj
15	in	in	ADP	_	16 quest	case
16	quest	quest	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 undertake	obl
17	of	of	ADP	_	19 thief	case
18	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	19 thief	det
19	thief	thief	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 quest	nmod
20	.	.	PUNCT	_	9 denied	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	deny	past · passive		the State reason		originally property	vn conjecture-29.5 «NP V NP to be NP»: subject=Theme permission=Eventuality
2	undertake	to-infinitive		the journey	quest of the thief		vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent journey=Eventuality
3	quest		the thief				nom quest «cognition intransitive»: of=agent

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

his father wanted him to stay home safe

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	2 father	nmod:poss
2	father	father	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 wanted	nsubj
3	wanted	want	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 wanted	obj
5	to	to	PART	_	6 stay	mark
6	stay	stay	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 wanted	xcomp
7	home	home	ADV	_	6 stay	advmod
8	safe	safe	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 stay	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	want	past	his father	him = he					tree rules
2	stay not said to happen	to-infinitive	him = he not said here					home, safe property	vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

Option 2

his mother thought the road was too dangerous

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	2 mother	nmod:poss
2	mother	mother	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 thought	nsubj
3	thought	think	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 road	det
5	road	road	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 dangerous	nsubj
6	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	8 dangerous	cop
7	too	too	ADV	_	8 dangerous	advmod
8	dangerous	dangerous	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 thought	ccomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	think speech: other	past	his mother						vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
2	is	past	the road					dangerous property	tree rules

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

his father feared some harm might befall him

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	2 father	nmod:poss
2	father	father	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 feared	nsubj
3	feared	fear	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	some	some	DET	PronType=Ind	5 harm	det
5	harm	harm	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 befall	nsubj
6	might	might	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	7 befall	aux
7	befall	befall	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 feared	ccomp
8	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 befall	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	fear	past	his father						vn admire-31.2-1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus
2	befall	might	some harm	father					tree rules

Option 4

he was not wanted

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	4 wanted	nsubj
2	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 wanted	aux:pass
3	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	4 wanted	advmod
4	wanted	want	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	not want	past · passive		he					vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: subject=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/1934-pg7277-part71/e4/