Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxv.--how Two Bendega Young Men Changed Their Skins., part 4, sentence 9
If a man was poor, very few people would attend the funeral, but if he were rich many people would come.
Who acts: man, few people · What happens: be, attend, come · To what, where: funeral
This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xxv.--how Two Bendega Young Men Changed Their Skins., part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, few 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 | If | if | SCONJ | _ | 5 poor | mark |
| 2 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 man | det |
| 3 | man | man | NOUN | Number=Sing | 5 poor | nsubj |
| 4 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 5 poor | cop |
| 5 | poor | poor | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 11 attend | advcl |
| 6 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 5 poor | punct |
| 7 | very | very | ADV | _ | 8 few | advmod |
| 8 | few | few | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 9 people | amod |
| 9 | people | people | NOUN | Number=Plur | 11 attend | nsubj |
| 10 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 11 attend | aux |
| 11 | attend | attend | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | root | root |
| 12 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 13 funeral | det |
| 13 | funeral | funeral | NOUN | Number=Sing | 11 attend | obj |
| 14 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 23 come | punct |
| 15 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 23 come | cc |
| 16 | if | if | SCONJ | _ | 23 come | mark |
| 17 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 23 come | nsubj |
| 18 | were | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 23 come | aux |
| 19 | rich | rich | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 21 people | amod |
| 20 | many | many | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 21 people | amod |
| 21 | people | people | NOUN | Number=Plur | 23 come | nsubj |
| 22 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 23 come | aux |
| 23 | come | come | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 11 attend | conj |
| 24 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 11 attend | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | is a condition, not said to happen | past | a man | poor property | tree rules | ||||
| 2 | attend | would | few people | the funeral | vn attend-107.4-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme funeral=Goal | ||||
| 3 | come a condition, not said to happen | would · past | man | rich many people nsubj | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=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/pg70959/21/9/