The Violet Fairy Book, The Child Who Came From an Egg, sentence 85
About this time a terrible war broke out, and the king and his army were beaten back and back, till at length they had to retire into the town, and make ready for a siege.
Who acts: terrible war, words, length · What happens: break out, beat back, have, retire, make · To what, where: king, length, town
This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Child Who Came From an Egg. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (terrible war, words, length), 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 | About | about | ADP | _ | 3 time | case |
| 2 | this | this | DET | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 3 time | det |
| 3 | time | time | NOUN | Number=Sing | 7 broke | obl |
| 4 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 6 war | det |
| 5 | terrible | terrible | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 6 war | amod |
| 6 | war | war | NOUN | Number=Sing | 7 broke | nsubj |
| 7 | broke | break | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 8 | out | out | ADP | _ | 7 broke | compound:prt |
| 9 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 17 beaten | punct |
| 10 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 17 beaten | cc |
| 11 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 12 king | det |
| 12 | king | king | NOUN | Number=Sing | 17 beaten | nsubj |
| 13 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 15 army | cc |
| 14 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 15 army | nmod:poss |
| 15 | army | army | NOUN | Number=Sing | 12 king | conj |
| 16 | were | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 17 beaten | aux:pass |
| 17 | beaten | beat | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 7 broke | parataxis |
| 18 | back | back | ADV | _ | 17 beaten | advmod |
| 19 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 20 back | cc |
| 20 | back | back | ADV | _ | 18 back | conj |
| 21 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 24 length | punct |
| 22 | till | till | ADP | _ | 24 length | case |
| 23 | at | at | ADP | _ | 24 length | case |
| 24 | length | length | NOUN | Number=Sing | 17 beaten | conj |
| 25 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 26 had | nsubj |
| 26 | had | have | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 24 length | acl:relcl |
| 27 | to | to | PART | _ | 28 retire | mark |
| 28 | retire | retire | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 26 had | xcomp |
| 29 | into | into | ADP | _ | 31 town | case |
| 30 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 31 town | det |
| 31 | town | town | NOUN | Number=Sing | 28 retire | obl |
| 32 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 34 make | punct |
| 33 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 34 make | cc |
| 34 | make | make | VERB | Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin | 7 broke | parataxis |
| 35 | ready | ready | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 34 make | xcomp |
| 36 | for | for | ADP | _ | 38 siege | case |
| 37 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 38 siege | det |
| 38 | siege | siege | NOUN | Number=Sing | 35 ready | obl |
| 39 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 7 broke | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | break out | past | a terrible war | time | vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Patient | ||||
| 2 | beat back | past · passive | the king and king's army | vn sound_emission-43.2 «PP.location V NP»: subject=Theme | |||||
| 3 | have | past | words = word | length not said here | tree rules | ||||
| 4 | retire | to-infinitive | length not said here | the town | vn resign-10.11-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | ||||
| 5 | make | infinitive | ready property | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset |
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 Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 641 (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/pg641/12/85/