Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xix.--why the Mist Rises From the Water., sentence 46
When they were fast asleep, they would be covered up with dry palm leaves and then burnt to death.
Who acts: witches · What happens: be, cover up · To what, where: witches
This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xix.--why the Mist Rises From the Water.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (witches), 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 | When | when | SCONJ | _ | 5 asleep | mark |
| 2 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 5 asleep | nsubj |
| 3 | were | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 5 asleep | cop |
| 4 | fast | fast | ADV | Degree=Pos | 5 asleep | advmod |
| 5 | asleep | asleep | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 10 covered | advcl |
| 6 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 5 asleep | punct |
| 7 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 10 covered | nsubj:pass |
| 8 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 10 covered | aux |
| 9 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 10 covered | aux:pass |
| 10 | covered | cover | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | root | root |
| 11 | up | up | ADP | _ | 10 covered | compound:prt |
| 12 | with | with | ADP | _ | 15 leaves | case |
| 13 | dry | dry | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 15 leaves | amod |
| 14 | palm | palm | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 leaves | compound |
| 15 | leaves | leaf | NOUN | Number=Plur | 10 covered | obl |
| 16 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 18 burnt | cc |
| 17 | then | then | ADV | PronType=Dem | 18 burnt | advmod |
| 18 | burnt | burnt | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 15 leaves | conj |
| 19 | to | to | ADP | _ | 20 death | case |
| 20 | death | death | NOUN | Number=Sing | 18 burnt | obl |
| 21 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 10 covered | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | is | past | witches = witch | asleep, fast property | tree rules | ||||
| 2 | cover up | would · passive | witches = witch | with dry palm leaves | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP PP.theme»: subject=Destination with leaf=Theme |
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/pg70959/14/46/