Hawaiian Historical Legends, Last of the Tabu, sentence 12

One bright afternoon a tall, finely formed woman broke through the arching branches which obstructed the path and approached the door where an old woman sat crooning to a child resting in her arms.

Who acts: tall formed woman, arching branches, old woman · What happens: form, break, obstruct, approach, sit, croon · To what, where: arching branches, path, door, child, arms

This is a sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Last of the Tabu. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (tall formed woman, arching branches, old woman), 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	One	one	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	3 afternoon	nummod
2	bright	bright	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 afternoon	amod
3	afternoon	afternoon	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 broke	obl:unmarked
4	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	9 woman	det
5	tall	tall	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 woman	amod
6	,	,	PUNCT	_	5 tall	punct
7	finely	finely	ADV	_	8 formed	advmod
8	formed	form	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	9 woman	amod
9	woman	woman	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 broke	nsubj
10	broke	break	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
11	through	through	ADP	_	14 branches	case
12	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	14 branches	det
13	arching	arching	NOUN	Number=Sing	14 branches	compound
14	branches	branch	NOUN	Number=Plur	10 broke	obl
15	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	16 obstructed	nsubj
16	obstructed	obstruct	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	14 branches	acl:relcl
17	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	18 path	det
18	path	path	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 obstructed	obj
19	and	and	CCONJ	_	20 approached	cc
20	approached	approach	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	10 broke	conj
21	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	22 door	det
22	door	door	NOUN	Number=Sing	20 approached	obj
23	where	where	ADV	PronType=Rel	27 sat	advmod
24	an	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	26 woman	det
25	old	old	ADJ	Degree=Pos	26 woman	amod
26	woman	woman	NOUN	Number=Sing	27 sat	nsubj
27	sat	sit	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	22 door	acl:relcl
28	crooning	croon	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	27 sat	xcomp
29	to	to	ADP	_	31 child	case
30	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	31 child	det
31	child	child	NOUN	Number=Sing	28 crooning	obl
32	resting	rest	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	28 crooning	advcl
33	in	in	ADP	_	35 arms	case
34	her	her	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	35 arms	nmod:poss
35	arms	arm	NOUN	Number=Plur	32 resting	obl
36	.	.	PUNCT	_	10 broke	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	form	participle						finely property	vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	break	past	a tall formed woman			the arching branches	afternoon		vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme through branch=Location
3	obstruct	past	the arching branches	the path					vn discourage-64.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Causer path=Eventuality
4	approach	past	a tall formed woman not said here	the door					vn confront-98 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent door=Theme
5	sit	past	a old woman						tree rules
6	croon speech: other	gerund	a old woman not said here		a child				vn manner_speaking-37.3 «NP V PP.recipient»: agent=Agent to child=Recipient
7	rest	gerund	a old woman not said here			Hawaii's arms			vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in arm=Location

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/pg66357/19/12/

🌲 Hawaiian Historical Legends, Last of the Tabu, sentence 12

The tree

Pragmatics

Hawaiian Historical Legends, Last of the Tabu, sentence 12