Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Farm-yard Cock and the Weather-cock, sentence 18
He had been born old, and did not at all resemble the birds flying in the air--the sparrows, and the swallows; no, he despised them, these mean little piping birds, these common whistlers.
Who acts: birds, yard · What happens: bear, not resemble, fly, despise · To what, where: yard, birds, all, air
This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Farm-yard Cock and the Weather-cock. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (birds, yard), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.
Checked tree. This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (gutenberg:pg27200:1271): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18.
The tree
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 | 4 born | nsubj:pass |
| 2 | had | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 born | aux |
| 3 | been | be | AUX | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part | 4 born | aux:pass |
| 4 | born | bear | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | root | root |
| 5 | old | old | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 4 born | xcomp |
| 6 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 8 did | punct |
| 7 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 8 did | cc |
| 8 | did | do | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 12 resemble | aux |
| 9 | not | not | PART | Polarity=Neg | 12 resemble | advmod |
| 10 | at | at | ADP | _ | 11 all | case |
| 11 | all | all | DET | PronType=Tot | 12 resemble | obl |
| 12 | resemble | resemble | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 4 born | conj |
| 13 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 14 birds | det |
| 14 | birds | bird | NOUN | Number=Plur | 12 resemble | obj |
| 15 | flying | fly | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 14 birds | acl |
| 16 | in | in | ADP | _ | 18 air | case |
| 17 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 18 air | det |
| 18 | air | air | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 flying | obl |
| 19 | -- | -- | PUNCT | _ | 21 sparrows | punct |
| 20 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 21 sparrows | det |
| 21 | sparrows | sparrow | NOUN | Number=Plur | 14 birds | appos |
| 22 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 25 swallows | punct |
| 23 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 25 swallows | cc |
| 24 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 25 swallows | det |
| 25 | swallows | swallow | NOUN | Number=Plur | 21 sparrows | conj |
| 26 | ; | ; | PUNCT | _ | 30 despised | punct |
| 27 | no | no | INTJ | Polarity=Neg | 30 despised | discourse |
| 28 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 30 despised | punct |
| 29 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 30 despised | nsubj |
| 30 | despised | despise | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 born | parataxis |
| 31 | them | they | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 30 despised | obj |
| 32 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 37 birds | punct |
| 33 | these | this | DET | Number=Plur PronType=Dem | 37 birds | det |
| 34 | mean | mean | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 37 birds | amod |
| 35 | little | little | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 37 birds | amod |
| 36 | piping | piping | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 37 birds | amod |
| 37 | birds | bird | NOUN | Number=Plur | 31 them | appos |
| 38 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 41 whistlers | punct |
| 39 | these | this | DET | Number=Plur PronType=Dem | 41 whistlers | det |
| 40 | common | common | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 41 whistlers | amod |
| 41 | whistlers | whistler | NOUN | Number=Plur | 31 them | appos |
| 42 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 born | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | bear | past · perfect · passive | yard | old property | vn birth-28.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient | ||||
| 2 | not resemble | past · do-support | the birds | all | tree rules | ||||
| 3 | fly | gerund | the birds not said here | the air | vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in air=Location | ||||
| 4 | despise | past | yard | birds = bird | vn admire-31.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer they=Stimulus |
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: «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (public domain in the USA). Tree: the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the chapter read in order.
This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/19/18/