Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxv.--how Two Bendega Young Men Changed Their Skins., part 3, sentence 7

The head slave waited until the day came for the women to bring their camwood to be counted, and then told his wife to keep back three balls of camwood, so that if the chief flogged her, he would be able to give a good reason to the other slaves why they should kill their master.

Who acts: head slave, day, chief, slaves · What happens: wait, come, bring, count, tell, keep back · To what, where: camwood, wife, three balls, Erim, good reason, other slaves · Speech: someone speaks here

This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xxv.--how Two Bendega Young Men Changed Their Skins., part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (head slave, day, chief, slaves), 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 slave	det
2	head	head	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 slave	compound
3	slave	slave	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 waited	nsubj
4	waited	wait	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	until	until	SCONJ	_	8 came	mark
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 day	det
7	day	day	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 came	nsubj
8	came	come	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 waited	advcl
9	for	for	ADP	_	11 women	case
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 women	det
11	women	woman	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 came	obl
12	to	to	PART	_	13 bring	mark
13	bring	bring	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	8 came	advcl
14	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	15 camwood	nmod:poss
15	camwood	camwood	NOUN	Number=Sing	13 bring	obj
16	to	to	PART	_	18 counted	mark
17	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	18 counted	aux:pass
18	counted	count	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	13 bring	advcl
19	,	,	PUNCT	_	22 told	punct
20	and	and	CCONJ	_	22 told	cc
21	then	then	ADV	PronType=Dem	22 told	advmod
22	told	tell	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 waited	conj
23	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	24 wife	nmod:poss
24	wife	wife	NOUN	Number=Sing	22 told	iobj
25	to	to	PART	_	26 keep	mark
26	keep	keep	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	22 told	xcomp
27	back	back	ADV	_	26 keep	advmod
28	three	three	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	29 balls	nummod
29	balls	ball	NOUN	Number=Plur	26 keep	obj
30	of	of	ADP	_	31 camwood	case
31	camwood	camwood	NOUN	Number=Sing	29 balls	nmod
32	,	,	PUNCT	_	44 able	punct
33	so	so	SCONJ	_	44 able	mark
34	that	that	SCONJ	_	44 able	mark
35	if	if	SCONJ	_	38 flogged	mark
36	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	37 chief	det
37	chief	chief	NOUN	Number=Sing	38 flogged	nsubj
38	flogged	flog	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	44 able	advcl
39	her	she	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	38 flogged	obj
40	,	,	PUNCT	_	38 flogged	punct
41	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	44 able	nsubj
42	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	44 able	aux
43	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	44 able	cop
44	able	able	ADJ	Degree=Pos	22 told	ccomp
45	to	to	PART	_	46 give	mark
46	give	give	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	44 able	xcomp
47	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	49 reason	det
48	good	good	ADJ	Degree=Pos	49 reason	amod
49	reason	reason	NOUN	Number=Sing	46 give	obj
50	to	to	ADP	_	53 slaves	case
51	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	53 slaves	det
52	other	other	ADJ	Degree=Pos	53 slaves	amod
53	slaves	slave	NOUN	Number=Plur	49 reason	nmod
54	why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	57 kill	advmod
55	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	57 kill	nsubj
56	should	should	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	57 kill	aux
57	kill	kill	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	46 give	advcl
58	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	59 master	nmod:poss
59	master	master	NOUN	Number=Sing	57 kill	obj
60	.	.	PUNCT	_	4 waited	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	when	other	roles by
1	wait	past	the head slave					vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	come	past	the day				for the women	vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
3	bring	to-infinitive	the day not said here	slaves's camwood				vn bring-11.3-1 «NP V NP together»: agent=Agent camwood=Theme
4	count	to-infinitive · passive	the day not said here					vn matter-91 «NP V»
5	tell speech: assert	past	the head slave not said here		son's wife	then		vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Agent wife=Recipient clause=Topic
6	keep back not said to happen	to-infinitive	the head slave not said here	three balls of camwood				vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent ball=Theme
7	flog a condition, not said to happen	past	the chief	Erim				vn spank-18.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Patient
8	is	would	Chief				able property	tree rules
9	give	to-infinitive	Chief not said here	a good reason	the other slaves			vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent reason=Theme to slave=Recipient
10	kill	should	slaves = slave	slaves's master				vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent master=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/pg70959/20/7/

🌲 Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxv.--how Two Bendega Young Men Changed Their Skins., part 3, sentence 7

The tree

Pragmatics

Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxv.--how Two Bendega Young Men Changed Their Skins., part 3, sentence 7