Hawaiian Historical Legends, First Foreigners, sentence 9
Balboa must have wished for a Nicaraguan or Panama Canal when he carried timbers across the isthmus and built a ship on the Pacific coast to explore the new ocean which he had discovered.
Who acts: Balboa · What happens: wish, carry, build, explore, discover · To what, where: Balboa, timbers, isthmus, ship, Pacific coast, new ocean
This is a sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, First Foreigners. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Balboa), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.
Mova's own parse. This tree may be wrong.
The tree
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Balboa | Balboa | PROPN | Number=Sing | 4 wished | nsubj:pass |
| 2 | must | must | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 4 wished | aux |
| 3 | have | have | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 4 wished | aux |
| 4 | wished | wish | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | root | root |
| 5 | for | for | ADP | _ | 10 Canal | case |
| 6 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 10 Canal | det |
| 7 | Nicaraguan | Nicaraguan | PROPN | Number=Sing | 10 Canal | compound |
| 8 | or | or | CCONJ | _ | 9 Panama | cc |
| 9 | Panama | Panama | PROPN | Number=Sing | 7 Nicaraguan | conj |
| 10 | Canal | Canal | PROPN | Number=Sing | 4 wished | obl |
| 11 | when | when | ADV | PronType=Int | 13 carried | advmod |
| 12 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 13 carried | nsubj |
| 13 | carried | carry | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 wished | advcl |
| 14 | timbers | timber | NOUN | Number=Plur | 13 carried | obj |
| 15 | across | across | ADP | _ | 17 isthmus | case |
| 16 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 17 isthmus | det |
| 17 | isthmus | isthmus | NOUN | Number=Sing | 13 carried | obl |
| 18 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 19 built | cc |
| 19 | built | build | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 wished | conj |
| 20 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 21 ship | det |
| 21 | ship | ship | NOUN | Number=Sing | 19 built | obj |
| 22 | on | on | ADP | _ | 25 coast | case |
| 23 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 25 coast | det |
| 24 | Pacific | Pacific | PROPN | Number=Sing | 25 coast | compound |
| 25 | coast | coast | NOUN | Number=Sing | 19 built | obl |
| 26 | to | to | PART | _ | 27 explore | mark |
| 27 | explore | explore | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 19 built | advcl |
| 28 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 30 ocean | det |
| 29 | new | new | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 30 ocean | amod |
| 30 | ocean | ocean | NOUN | Number=Sing | 27 explore | obj |
| 31 | which | which | PRON | PronType=Rel | 34 discovered | nsubj:pass |
| 32 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 34 discovered | nsubj |
| 33 | had | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 34 discovered | aux |
| 34 | discovered | discover | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 30 ocean | acl:relcl |
| 35 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 wished | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | wish | must · perfect · passive | Balboa | for a Nicaraguan Canal | vn wish-62 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme | ||||
| 2 | carry | past | Balboa | timbers | the isthmus | vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent timber=Theme | |||
| 3 | build | past | a ship | the Pacific coast | vn base-97.1 «NP V NP PP.source»: agent=Agent ship=Theme on coast=Source | ||||
| 4 | explore | to-infinitive | the new ocean | vn investigate-35.4 «NP V NP.location»: agent=Agent ocean=Location | |||||
| 5 | discover | past · perfect · passive | the new ocean | Balboa nsubj | vn discover-84-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Topic |
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: «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Project Gutenberg book 66357 (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/pg66357/11/9/