Three hundred Aesop’s fables, Aesop’s Fables, part 13, sentence 4

The grasshoppers and sparrows entreated him not to cut down the tree that sheltered them, but to spare it, and they would sing to him and lighten his labours.

Who acts: grasshoppers, tree · What happens: entreat, not cut down, shelter, spare, sing, lighten · To what, where: Tree, grasshoppers, fruit, labours

This is a sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 13. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (grasshoppers, tree), 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 grasshoppers	det
2	grasshoppers	grasshopper	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 entreated	nsubj
3	and	and	CCONJ	_	4 sparrows	cc
4	sparrows	sparrow	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 grasshoppers	conj
5	entreated	entreat	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 entreated	obj
7	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	9 cut	advmod
8	to	to	PART	_	9 cut	mark
9	cut	cut	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	5 entreated	xcomp
10	down	down	ADP	_	9 cut	compound:prt
11	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 tree	det
12	tree	tree	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 cut	obj
13	that	that	PRON	PronType=Rel	14 sheltered	nsubj
14	sheltered	shelter	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	12 tree	acl:relcl
15	them	they	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	14 sheltered	obj
16	,	,	PUNCT	_	19 spare	punct
17	but	but	CCONJ	_	19 spare	cc
18	to	to	PART	_	19 spare	mark
19	spare	spare	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	9 cut	conj
20	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	19 spare	obj
21	,	,	PUNCT	_	25 sing	punct
22	and	and	CCONJ	_	25 sing	cc
23	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	25 sing	nsubj
24	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	25 sing	aux
25	sing	sing	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	5 entreated	parataxis
26	to	to	ADP	_	27 him	case
27	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	25 sing	obl
28	and	and	CCONJ	_	29 lighten	cc
29	lighten	lighten	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	25 sing	conj
30	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	31 labours	nmod:poss
31	labours	labour	NOUN	Number=Plur	29 lighten	obj
32	.	.	PUNCT	_	5 entreated	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	roles by
1	entreat	past	the grasshoppers and sparrows	Tree		vn urge-58.1-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent he=Recipient clause=Topic
2	not cut down	to-infinitive	the grasshoppers and sparrows not said here	the tree		vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset tree=Product
3	shelter	past	the tree	grasshoppers = grasshopper		vn concealment-16 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Patient
4	spare	to-infinitive	the grasshoppers and sparrows not said here	fruit		vn bill-54.5 «NP V NP NP.asset»: agent=Agent it=Asset
5	sing speech: express	would	grasshoppers = grasshopper		Tree	vn manner_speaking-37.3 «NP V PP.recipient»: agent=Agent to he=Recipient
6	lighten	infinitive	grasshoppers = grasshopper not said here	Tree's labours		vn remedy-45.7-1 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent labour=Patient

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: «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Project Gutenberg book 21 (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/pg21/15/4/