Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Opening, sentence 113
The Umbaji people exchanging salt and _house rats_ (which form an article of diet for the Bassankwala people, who are cannibals) for palm oil and yams.
Who acts: Umbaji people, Bassankwala people · What happens: exchange, form, be, article · To what, where: salt, article, cannibals, Umbaji people, diet
This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Opening. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Umbaji people, Bassankwala people), 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 | The | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 3 people | det |
| 2 | Umbaji | Umbaji | PROPN | Number=Sing | 3 people | compound |
| 3 | people | people | NOUN | Number=Plur | root | root |
| 4 | exchanging | exchange | VERB | VerbForm=Ger | 3 people | acl |
| 5 | salt | salt | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 exchanging | obj |
| 6 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 9 rats | cc |
| 7 | _ | _ | PUNCT | _ | 9 rats | punct |
| 8 | house | house | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 rats | compound |
| 9 | rats | rat | NOUN | Number=Plur | 5 salt | conj |
| 10 | _ | _ | PUNCT | _ | 13 form | punct |
| 11 | ( | ( | PUNCT | _ | 13 form | punct |
| 12 | which | which | PRON | PronType=Rel | 13 form | nsubj |
| 13 | form | form | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 4 exchanging | advcl |
| 14 | an | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 15 article | det |
| 15 | article | article | NOUN | Number=Sing | 13 form | obj |
| 16 | of | of | ADP | _ | 17 diet | case |
| 17 | diet | diet | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 article | nmod |
| 18 | for | for | ADP | _ | 21 people | case |
| 19 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 21 people | det |
| 20 | Bassankwala | Bassankwala | PROPN | Number=Sing | 21 people | compound |
| 21 | people | people | NOUN | Number=Plur | 15 article | nmod |
| 22 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 25 cannibals | punct |
| 23 | who | who | PRON | PronType=Rel | 25 cannibals | nsubj |
| 24 | are | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 25 cannibals | cop |
| 25 | cannibals | cannibal | NOUN | Number=Plur | 21 people | appos |
| 26 | ) | ) | PUNCT | _ | 25 cannibals | punct |
| 27 | for | for | ADP | _ | 29 oil | case |
| 28 | palm | palm | NOUN | Number=Sing | 29 oil | compound |
| 29 | oil | oil | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 article | nmod |
| 30 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 31 yams | cc |
| 31 | yams | yam | NOUN | Number=Plur | 29 oil | conj |
| 32 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 3 people | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | exchange | gerund | the Umbaji people not said here | salt and house rats | vn exchange-13.6.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent salt=Theme | ||||
| 2 | form | present | a article of diet | for the Bassankwala people; for palm oil and yams; which nsubj | vn create-26.4 «NP V NP PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent article=Result for people=Beneficiary | ||||
| 3 | is a | present | the Bassankwala people | cannibals | tree rules | ||||
| 5 | article | diet | for the Bassankwala people; for palm oil and yams | nom article «communication transitive»: of=patient for=obl for=obl |
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: «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Project Gutenberg book 70959 (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/pg70959/1/113/