The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 10, sentence 25

The officials began to laugh when they heard the Sultan's command, but as soon as they could speak they said, "Deign, your highness, to excuse our mirth, but those lines were not written by a man but by a monkey."

Who acts: officials, Deign, man, Sultan · What happens: begin, laugh, hear, speak, say, excuse · To what, where: command, mirth, lines · Speech: someone speaks here

This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 10. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (officials, Deign, man, Sultan), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher. This tree is Mova's own parse (the en model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

The tree

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 officials	det
2	officials	official	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 began	nsubj
3	began	begin	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	to	to	PART	_	5 laugh	mark
5	laugh	laugh	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 began	xcomp
6	when	when	ADV	PronType=Int	8 heard	advmod
7	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	8 heard	nsubj
8	heard	hear	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 laugh	advcl
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	10 Sultan	det
10	Sultan	Sultan	PROPN	Number=Sing	12 command	nmod:poss
11	's	's	PART	_	10 Sultan	case
12	command	command	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 heard	obj
13	,	,	PUNCT	_	22 said	punct
14	but	but	CCONJ	_	22 said	cc
15	as	as	ADV	_	16 soon	advmod
16	soon	soon	ADV	Degree=Pos	22 said	advmod
17	as	as	SCONJ	_	20 speak	mark
18	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	20 speak	nsubj
19	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	20 speak	aux
20	speak	speak	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	16 soon	advcl
21	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	22 said	nsubj
22	said	say	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 began	parataxis
23	,	,	PUNCT	_	25 Deign	punct
24	"	"	PUNCT	_	25 Deign	punct
25	Deign	Deign	PROPN	Number=Sing	31 excuse	nsubj
26	,	,	PUNCT	_	28 highness	punct
27	your	your	PRON	Case=Gen Person=2 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	28 highness	nmod:poss
28	highness	highness	NOUN	Number=Sing	25 Deign	appos
29	,	,	PUNCT	_	31 excuse	punct
30	to	to	PART	_	31 excuse	mark
31	excuse	excuse	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	22 said	ccomp
32	our	our	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=1 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	33 mirth	nmod:poss
33	mirth	mirth	NOUN	Number=Sing	31 excuse	obj
34	,	,	PUNCT	_	40 written	punct
35	but	but	CCONJ	_	40 written	cc
36	those	that	DET	Number=Plur PronType=Dem	37 lines	det
37	lines	line	NOUN	Number=Plur	40 written	nsubj:pass
38	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	40 written	aux:pass
39	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	40 written	advmod
40	written	write	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	3 began	parataxis
41	by	by	ADP	_	43 man	case
42	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	43 man	det
43	man	man	NOUN	Number=Sing	40 written	obl
44	but	but	CCONJ	_	47 monkey	cc
45	by	by	ADP	_	47 monkey	case
46	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	47 monkey	det
47	monkey	monkey	NOUN	Number=Sing	43 man	conj
48	.	.	PUNCT	_	40 written	punct
49	"	"	PUNCT	_	3 began	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	begin	past	the officials			vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality
2	laugh	to-infinitive	the officials not said here			vn nonverbal_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent
3	hear	past	officials = official	the Sultan's command		vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer command=Stimulus
4	speak speech: other	could	officials = official			vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent
5	say speech: assert	past	officials = official		soon property	vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
6	excuse in a quote	to-infinitive	Deign	our mirth		vn judgment-33.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mirth=Theme
7	not write in a quote	past · passive	a man but a monkey	that lines		vn scribble-25.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent subject=Theme
8	command		the Sultan			nom command «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.

Text: «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 128 (public domain in the USA). Tree: Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the chapter read in order.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/10/25/