Exam question 4 · Grimm's Fairy Tales, The Four Skillful Brothers: the broth…

By what means did the thief secure his claim to the princess?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 3 · right ✓ · Who acts: thief · What happens: mean, secure, claim · To what, where: claim · Speech: someone speaks here

This is exam question 4 of lesson 768 «Grimm's Fairy Tales, The Four Skillful Brothers: the brothers save the princess and share the reward» 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	By	by	SCONJ	_	3 means	mark
2	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	3 means	nsubj
3	means	mean	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	did	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	7 secure	aux
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 thief	det
6	thief	thief	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 secure	nsubj
7	secure	secure	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 means	ccomp
8	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	9 claim	nmod:poss
9	claim	claim	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 secure	obj
10	to	to	ADP	_	12 princess	case
11	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 princess	det
12	princess	princess	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 secure	obl
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 means	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	mean	present				vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
2	secure	past · do-support	the thief	thief's claim	to the princess	vn shake-22.3-2-1 «NP V NP PP»: agent=Agent claim=Patient to princess=Co-Patient
3	claim		thief			nom claim «communication transitive»: poss=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

He stole her away

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 stole	nsubj
2	stole	steal	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 stole	obj
4	away	away	ADV	_	2 stole	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	steal away	past	He	her = she				away property	vn appear-48.1.1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location she=Theme

Option 2

By sneaking her out at night

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	By	by	SCONJ	_	2 sneaking	mark
2	sneaking	sneak	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 sneaking	obj
4	out	out	ADP	_	2 sneaking	compound:prt
5	at	at	ADP	_	6 night	case
6	night	night	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 sneaking	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	sneak out	gerund		her = she			night		vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Agent

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

He stole her from beneath the dragon

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 stole	nsubj
2	stole	steal	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 stole	obj
4	from	from	ADP	_	7 dragon	case
5	beneath	beneath	ADP	_	7 dragon	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 dragon	det
7	dragon	dragon	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 stole	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	steal	past	He	her = she				from the dragon	vn steal-10.5-1 «NP V NP PP.source»: agent=Agent she=Theme from dragon=Source

Option 4

He snatched her while it slept

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 snatched	nsubj
2	snatched	snatch	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 snatched	obj
4	while	while	SCONJ	_	6 slept	mark
5	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	6 slept	nsubj
6	slept	sleep	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	2 snatched	advcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	snatch	past	He	her = she					vn obtain-13.5.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Theme
2	sleep	past	it						vn snooze-40.4-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

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/768-pg2591-part44/e4/