The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Unfinished Boat, sentence 51
Men called him Sampsa, and they told many a tale of his wisdom and cunning, and how in former times he had guarded the treasures of kings.
Who acts: Men, dwarf, wisdom · What happens: call, tell, guard, treasure · To what, where: dwarf, many tale, treasures, kings · Speech: someone speaks here
This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Unfinished Boat. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Men, dwarf, wisdom), 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 | Men | man | NOUN | Number=Plur | 2 called | nsubj |
| 2 | called | call | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 3 | him | he | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 2 called | obj |
| 4 | Sampsa | Sampsa | PROPN | Number=Sing | 2 called | xcomp |
| 5 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 8 told | punct |
| 6 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 8 told | cc |
| 7 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 8 told | nsubj |
| 8 | told | tell | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 2 called | conj |
| 9 | many | many | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 11 tale | amod |
| 10 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 11 tale | det |
| 11 | tale | tale | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 told | obj |
| 12 | of | of | ADP | _ | 14 wisdom | case |
| 13 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 14 wisdom | nmod:poss |
| 14 | wisdom | wisdom | NOUN | Number=Sing | 11 tale | nmod |
| 15 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 16 cunning | cc |
| 16 | cunning | cunning | NOUN | Number=Sing | 14 wisdom | conj |
| 17 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 25 guarded | punct |
| 18 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 25 guarded | cc |
| 19 | how | how | ADV | PronType=Int | 25 guarded | advmod |
| 20 | in | in | ADP | _ | 22 times | case |
| 21 | former | former | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 22 times | amod |
| 22 | times | time | NOUN | Number=Plur | 25 guarded | obl |
| 23 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 25 guarded | nsubj |
| 24 | had | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 25 guarded | aux |
| 25 | guarded | guard | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part | 8 told | ccomp |
| 26 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 27 treasures | det |
| 27 | treasures | treasure | NOUN | Number=Plur | 25 guarded | obj |
| 28 | of | of | ADP | _ | 29 kings | case |
| 29 | kings | king | NOUN | Number=Plur | 27 treasures | nmod |
| 30 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 2 called | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | call | past | Men | dwarf | Sampsa xcomp | vn initiate_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent he=Recipient | |||
| 2 | tell speech: assert | past | men = man | a many tale of dwarf's wisdom and cunning | vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP what S»: agent=Agent tale=Recipient clause=Topic | ||||
| 3 | guard | past · perfect | dwarf | the treasures of kings | time | vn defend-72.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent treasure=Beneficiary | |||
| 4 | tell | dwarf's wisdom and cunning | nom tale «communication intransitive»: of=agent | ||||||
| 5 | treasure | kings | nom treasure «possession transitive»: of=patient |
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 Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 66819 (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/pg66819/13/51/