Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Will-o-the Wisp Is in the Town, Says the Moor Woman, sentence 1
There was a man who once knew many stories, but they had slipped away from him--so he said.
Who acts: man, stories · What happens: be, know, slip away, say · To what, where: many stories · Speech: someone speaks here
This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Will-o-the Wisp Is in the Town, Says the Moor Woman. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, stories), 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 | There | there | PRON | PronType=Dem | 2 was | expl |
| 2 | was | be | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 3 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 4 man | det |
| 4 | man | man | NOUN | Number=Sing | 2 was | nsubj |
| 5 | who | who | PRON | PronType=Rel | 7 knew | nsubj |
| 6 | once | once | ADV | NumForm=Word NumType=Mult | 7 knew | advmod |
| 7 | knew | know | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 man | acl:relcl |
| 8 | many | many | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 9 stories | amod |
| 9 | stories | story | NOUN | Number=Plur | 7 knew | obj |
| 10 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 14 slipped | punct |
| 11 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 14 slipped | cc |
| 12 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 14 slipped | nsubj |
| 13 | had | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 14 slipped | aux |
| 14 | slipped | slip | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part | 7 knew | parataxis |
| 15 | away | away | ADV | _ | 14 slipped | advmod |
| 16 | from | from | ADP | _ | 17 him | case |
| 17 | him | he | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 15 away | obl |
| 18 | -- | -- | PUNCT | _ | 21 said | punct |
| 19 | so | so | ADV | _ | 21 said | advmod |
| 20 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 21 said | nsubj |
| 21 | said | say | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 2 was | parataxis |
| 22 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 2 was | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | be | past | a man | there | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | ||||
| 2 | know | past | a man | many stories | once property | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer story=Stimulus | |||
| 3 | slip away | past · perfect | stories = story | away property | vn calibratable_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute | ||||
| 4 | say speech: assert | past | man | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=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: «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (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/pg27200/211/1/