The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 31, sentence 80

He opened the paper, not knowing what it might contain, and was astonished to find that it was the acknowledgment of a large debt that was owing to his father.

Who acts: wanderer, paper, large debt · What happens: open, not know, contain, be, find, owe · To what, where: paper, acknowledgment, father · Speech: someone speaks here

This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 31. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wanderer, paper, large debt), 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	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 opened	nsubj
2	opened	open	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 paper	det
4	paper	paper	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 opened	obj
5	,	,	PUNCT	_	7 knowing	punct
6	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	7 knowing	advmod
7	knowing	know	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 opened	advcl
8	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	11 contain	obj
9	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	11 contain	nsubj
10	might	might	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	11 contain	aux
11	contain	contain	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	7 knowing	ccomp
12	,	,	PUNCT	_	15 astonished	punct
13	and	and	CCONJ	_	15 astonished	cc
14	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	15 astonished	cop
15	astonished	astonished	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 opened	conj
16	to	to	PART	_	17 find	mark
17	find	find	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	15 astonished	xcomp
18	that	that	SCONJ	_	22 acknowledgment	mark
19	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	22 acknowledgment	nsubj
20	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	22 acknowledgment	cop
21	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	22 acknowledgment	det
22	acknowledgment	acknowledgment	NOUN	Number=Sing	17 find	ccomp
23	of	of	ADP	_	26 debt	case
24	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	26 debt	det
25	large	large	ADJ	Degree=Pos	26 debt	amod
26	debt	debt	NOUN	Number=Sing	22 acknowledgment	nmod
27	that	that	PRON	PronType=Rel	29 owing	nsubj
28	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	29 owing	aux
29	owing	owe	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	26 debt	acl:relcl
30	to	to	ADP	_	32 father	case
31	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	32 father	nmod:poss
32	father	father	NOUN	Number=Sing	29 owing	obl
33	.	.	PUNCT	_	2 opened	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	other	roles by
1	open	past	wanderer	the paper			vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location paper=Theme
2	not know	gerund	wanderer not said here				vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V how S_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus
3	contain	might	paper				vn comprise-107.2-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot what=Theme
4	is	past	wanderer not said here			astonished property	tree rules
5	find	to-infinitive	wanderer not said here				vn declare-29.4-1-1 «NP V what S_INF»: agent=Agent
6	is a	past	paper	the acknowledgment		of a large debt	tree rules
7	owe	past · progressive	a large debt		wanderer's father		vn future_having-13.3 «NP V NP PP.goal»: agent=Agent to father=Goal

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 Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3027 (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/pg3027/31/80/