The Book of Dragons, Opening, part 9, sentence 120
But the snakes knew the Queen was friends with their mistress; so, of course, they had to do their best to be civil.
Who acts: snakes, Queen · What happens: know, be, have, do · To what, where: friends, best
This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (snakes, Queen), 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 | But | but | CCONJ | _ | 4 knew | cc |
| 2 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 3 snakes | det |
| 3 | snakes | snake | NOUN | Number=Plur | 4 knew | nsubj |
| 4 | knew | know | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 8 friends | det |
| 6 | Queen | Queen | PROPN | Number=Sing | 8 friends | nsubj |
| 7 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 8 friends | cop |
| 8 | friends | friend | NOUN | Number=Plur | 4 knew | obj |
| 9 | with | with | ADP | _ | 11 mistress | case |
| 10 | their | their | PRON | Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 11 mistress | nmod:poss |
| 11 | mistress | mistress | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 friends | nmod |
| 12 | ; | ; | PUNCT | _ | 19 had | punct |
| 13 | so | so | ADV | _ | 19 had | advmod |
| 14 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 15 of | punct |
| 15 | of | of | ADP | _ | 13 so | fixed |
| 16 | course | course | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 of | fixed |
| 17 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 19 had | punct |
| 18 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 19 had | nsubj |
| 19 | had | have | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 knew | conj |
| 20 | to | to | PART | _ | 21 do | mark |
| 21 | do | do | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 19 had | xcomp |
| 22 | their | their | PRON | Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 23 best | nmod:poss |
| 23 | best | good | ADJ | Degree=Sup | 21 do | obj |
| 24 | to | to | PART | _ | 26 civil | mark |
| 25 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 26 civil | cop |
| 26 | civil | civil | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 23 best | advcl |
| 27 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 knew | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | know | past | the snakes | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer | |||||
| 2 | is a | past | Queen | the friends | with snakes's mistress | tree rules | |||
| 3 | have | past | snakes = snake | tree rules | |||||
| 4 | do | to-infinitive | snakes = snake not said here | snakes's best | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent good=Eventuality | ||||
| 5 | is | to-infinitive | snakes = snake not said here | civil property | tree rules |
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 Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Project Gutenberg book 23661 (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/pg23661/9/120/