Exam question 2 · Russian Fairy Tales, Vasilissa the Beautiful, part 34: Vas…

Which proverb does the doll offer Vasilissa before she retires to rest?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: proverb · What happens: offer, retire, rest · To what, where: Vasilissa

This is exam question 2 of lesson 442 «Russian Fairy Tales, Vasilissa the Beautiful, part 34: Vasilissa goes to Baba Yaga's for a light and gets through an impossible task» 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 proverb	det
2	proverb	proverb	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 offer	nsubj
3	does	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	6 offer	aux
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 doll	det
5	doll	doll	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 offer	nsubj
6	offer	offer	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
7	Vasilissa	Vasilissa	PROPN	Number=Sing	6 offer	obj
8	before	before	SCONJ	_	10 retires	mark
9	she	she	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	10 retires	nsubj
10	retires	retire	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	6 offer	advcl
11	to	to	PART	_	12 rest	mark
12	rest	rest	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	10 retires	xcomp
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	6 offer	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	offer	present · do-support	which proverb	Vasilissa	vn future_having-13.3 «NP V NP.theme (PP)»: agent=Agent vasilissa=Theme
2	retire	present	proverb		tree rules
3	rest	to-infinitive	proverb not said here		vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V»: agent=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

Night is wiser than the morning

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Night	night	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 wiser	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 wiser	cop
3	wiser	wise	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	root	root
4	than	than	ADP	_	6 morning	case
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 morning	det
6	morning	morning	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 wiser	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	Night				morning	wise property	tree rules

Option 2

The night brings better counsel

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 night	det
2	night	night	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 brings	nsubj
3	brings	bring	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	better	good	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	5 counsel	amod
5	counsel	counsel	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 brings	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	bring	present	the night	better counsel					vn bring-11.3-1 «NP V NP together»: agent=Agent counsel=Theme

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

The morning is wiser than the evening

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 morning	det
2	morning	morning	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 wiser	nsubj
3	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	4 wiser	cop
4	wiser	wise	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	root	root
5	than	than	ADP	_	7 evening	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 evening	det
7	evening	evening	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 wiser	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	present	the morning				evening	wise property	tree rules

Option 4

Wait till dawn

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Wait	wait	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
2	till	till	ADP	_	3 dawn	case
3	dawn	dawn	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Wait	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	wait	imperative	you not said here				dawn		vn exist-47.1 «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/442-pg22373-part34/e2/