The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories, The Blindness of Pi-waṕ-ōk, sentence 84
It was but a few steps to the foot of the cliff, where the fallen rocks made a sloping hill; they soon surmounted this, and then the climb began.
Who acts: mind, fallen rocks, steps, climb · What happens: be, fall, make, slope, surmount, begin · To what, where: few steps, sloping hill, this
This is a sentence of «The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, The Blindness of Pi-waṕ-ōk. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (mind, fallen rocks, steps, climb), 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 | It | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 6 steps | nsubj |
| 2 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 6 steps | cop |
| 3 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 6 steps | cc |
| 4 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 6 steps | det |
| 5 | few | few | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 6 steps | amod |
| 6 | steps | step | NOUN | Number=Plur | root | root |
| 7 | to | to | ADP | _ | 9 foot | case |
| 8 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 9 foot | det |
| 9 | foot | foot | NOUN | Number=Sing | 6 steps | nmod |
| 10 | of | of | ADP | _ | 12 cliff | case |
| 11 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 12 cliff | det |
| 12 | cliff | cliff | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 foot | nmod |
| 13 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 18 made | punct |
| 14 | where | where | ADV | PronType=Rel | 18 made | advmod |
| 15 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 17 rocks | det |
| 16 | fallen | fall | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 17 rocks | amod |
| 17 | rocks | rock | NOUN | Number=Plur | 18 made | nsubj |
| 18 | made | make | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 12 cliff | acl:relcl |
| 19 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 21 hill | det |
| 20 | sloping | slope | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 21 hill | amod |
| 21 | hill | hill | NOUN | Number=Sing | 18 made | obj |
| 22 | ; | ; | PUNCT | _ | 25 surmounted | punct |
| 23 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 25 surmounted | nsubj |
| 24 | soon | soon | ADV | Degree=Pos | 25 surmounted | advmod |
| 25 | surmounted | surmount | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 6 steps | parataxis |
| 26 | this | this | PRON | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 25 surmounted | obj |
| 27 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 32 began | punct |
| 28 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 32 began | cc |
| 29 | then | then | ADV | PronType=Dem | 32 began | advmod |
| 30 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 31 climb | det |
| 31 | climb | climb | NOUN | Number=Sing | 32 began | nsubj |
| 32 | began | begin | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 25 surmounted | conj |
| 33 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 6 steps | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | is a | past | mind | a few steps | to the foot of the cliff | tree rules | |||
| 2 | fall | participle | vn occur-48.3 «NP V»: agent=Theme | ||||||
| 3 | make | past | the fallen rocks | a sloping hill | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset hill=Product | ||||
| 4 | slope | gerund | vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | ||||||
| 5 | surmount | past | steps = step | this | soon property | vn contiguous_location-47.8 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme this=Co-Theme | |||
| 6 | begin | past | the climb | then | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
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 Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, Project Gutenberg book 66596 (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/pg66596/13/84/