The Violet Fairy Book, The Nunda, Eater of People, sentence 14
A few minutes went by, and a bird flew down from a neighbouring thicket, and ate all the dates, without leaving a single one.
Who acts: few minutes, bird · What happens: go by, fly down, neighbour, eat, leave · To what, where: neighbouring thicket, dates, single one
This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Nunda, Eater of People. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (few minutes, bird), 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 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 minutes | det |
| 2 | few | few | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 3 minutes | amod |
| 3 | minutes | minute | NOUN | Number=Plur | 4 went | nsubj |
| 4 | went | go | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | by | by | ADP | _ | 4 went | obl |
| 6 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 10 flew | punct |
| 7 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 10 flew | cc |
| 8 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 9 bird | det |
| 9 | bird | bird | NOUN | Number=Sing | 10 flew | nsubj |
| 10 | flew | fly | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 went | conj |
| 11 | down | down | ADP | _ | 10 flew | compound:prt |
| 12 | from | from | ADP | _ | 15 thicket | case |
| 13 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 15 thicket | det |
| 14 | neighbouring | neighbour | VERB | VerbForm=Ger | 15 thicket | amod |
| 15 | thicket | thicket | NOUN | Number=Sing | 10 flew | obl |
| 16 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 18 ate | punct |
| 17 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 18 ate | cc |
| 18 | ate | eat | VERB | Mood=Ind Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 went | conj |
| 19 | all | all | DET | PronType=Tot | 21 dates | det:predet |
| 20 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 21 dates | det |
| 21 | dates | date | NOUN | Number=Plur | 18 ate | obj |
| 22 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 24 leaving | punct |
| 23 | without | without | SCONJ | _ | 24 leaving | mark |
| 24 | leaving | leave | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 18 ate | advcl |
| 25 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 27 one | det |
| 26 | single | single | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 27 one | amod |
| 27 | one | one | NOUN | Number=Sing | 24 leaving | obj |
| 28 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 went | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | go by | past | a few minutes | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | |||||
| 2 | fly down | past | a bird | a neighbouring thicket | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme from thicket=Trajectory | ||||
| 3 | neighbour | gerund | tree rules | ||||||
| 4 | eat | past | a few minutes not said here | all dates | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent date=Patient | ||||
| 5 | leave | gerund | a few minutes not said here | a single one | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent one=Theme |
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/pg641/29/14/