The Violet Fairy Book, The Headless Dwarfs, sentence 15
About an hour before midnight, Hans entered the church and locked the door behind him, but what was his surprise when, in place of the darkness and silence he expected, he found the church brilliantly lighted, and a crowd of people sitting round a table playing cards.
Who acts: Hans, people · What happens: enter, lock, be, expect, find, light · To what, where: church, door, surprise, silence, cards
This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Headless Dwarfs. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Hans, people), 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 | ADV | _ | 3 hour | advmod |
| 2 | an | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 hour | det |
| 3 | hour | hour | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 entered | obl |
| 4 | before | before | ADP | _ | 5 midnight | case |
| 5 | midnight | midnight | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 hour | nmod |
| 6 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 3 hour | punct |
| 7 | Hans | Hans | PROPN | Number=Sing | 8 entered | nsubj |
| 8 | entered | enter | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 9 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 10 church | det |
| 10 | church | church | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 entered | obj |
| 11 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 12 locked | cc |
| 12 | locked | lock | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 8 entered | conj |
| 13 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 14 door | det |
| 14 | door | door | NOUN | Number=Sing | 12 locked | obj |
| 15 | behind | behind | ADP | _ | 16 him | case |
| 16 | him | he | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 12 locked | obl |
| 17 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 22 surprise | punct |
| 18 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 22 surprise | cc |
| 19 | what | what | PRON | PronType=Int | 22 surprise | nsubj |
| 20 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 22 surprise | cop |
| 21 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 22 surprise | nmod:poss |
| 22 | surprise | surprise | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 entered | obl |
| 23 | when | when | ADV | PronType=Int | 22 surprise | nmod |
| 24 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 26 place | punct |
| 25 | in | in | ADP | _ | 26 place | case |
| 26 | place | place | NOUN | Number=Sing | 23 when | appos |
| 27 | of | of | ADP | _ | 29 darkness | case |
| 28 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 29 darkness | det |
| 29 | darkness | darkness | NOUN | Number=Sing | 26 place | nmod |
| 30 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 31 silence | cc |
| 31 | silence | silence | NOUN | Number=Sing | 29 darkness | conj |
| 32 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 33 expected | nsubj |
| 33 | expected | expect | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 31 silence | acl:relcl |
| 34 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 36 found | punct |
| 35 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 36 found | nsubj |
| 36 | found | find | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 26 place | acl:relcl |
| 37 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 38 church | det |
| 38 | church | church | NOUN | Number=Sing | 36 found | obj |
| 39 | brilliantly | brilliantly | ADV | _ | 40 lighted | advmod |
| 40 | lighted | light | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 38 church | acl |
| 41 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 44 crowd | punct |
| 42 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 44 crowd | cc |
| 43 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 44 crowd | det |
| 44 | crowd | crowd | NOUN | Number=Sing | 36 found | obl |
| 45 | of | of | ADP | _ | 46 people | case |
| 46 | people | people | NOUN | Number=Plur | 44 crowd | nmod |
| 47 | sitting | sit | VERB | VerbForm=Ger | 46 people | acl |
| 48 | round | round | ADP | _ | 50 table | case |
| 49 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 50 table | det |
| 50 | table | table | NOUN | Number=Sing | 47 sitting | obl |
| 51 | playing | play | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 47 sitting | advcl |
| 52 | cards | card | NOUN | Number=Plur | 51 playing | obj |
| 53 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 8 entered | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | enter | past | Hans | the church | hour | vn escape-51.1-1-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme church=Destination | |||
| 2 | lock | past | Hans not said here | the door | behind Hans | vn tape-22.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent door=Patient | |||
| 3 | is a | past | Hans's surprise | tree rules | |||||
| 4 | expect | past | Hans | silence not said here | vn conjecture-29.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent silence=Theme | ||||
| 5 | find | past | Hans | the church | a crowd of people obl | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent church=Topic | |||
| 6 | light | participle | the church not said here | brilliantly property | vn preparing-26.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent | ||||
| 7 | sit | gerund | people not said here | round a table | vn assuming_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent | ||||
| 8 | play | gerund | people not said here | cards | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent card=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/pg641/33/15/