Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxxi.--chief Kekong’s Daughter ’ndere Who Married a Python., part 2, sentence 35
They were to surround a certain portion of the forest and set fire to the bush, then, as the animals came out, they were killed.
Who acts: people, animals · What happens: surround, set, come out, kill · To what, where: certain portion, fire, people
This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xxxi.--chief Kekong’s Daughter ’ndere Who Married a Python., part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (people, animals), 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 | They | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 4 surround | nsubj |
| 2 | were | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 surround | aux |
| 3 | to | to | PART | _ | 4 surround | mark |
| 4 | surround | surround | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | root | root |
| 5 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 7 portion | det |
| 6 | certain | certain | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 7 portion | amod |
| 7 | portion | portion | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 surround | obj |
| 8 | of | of | ADP | _ | 10 forest | case |
| 9 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 10 forest | det |
| 10 | forest | forest | NOUN | Number=Sing | 7 portion | nmod |
| 11 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 12 set | cc |
| 12 | set | set | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 4 surround | conj |
| 13 | fire | fire | NOUN | Number=Sing | 12 set | obj |
| 14 | to | to | ADP | _ | 16 bush | case |
| 15 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 16 bush | det |
| 16 | bush | bush | NOUN | Number=Sing | 12 set | obl |
| 17 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 18 then | punct |
| 18 | then | then | ADV | PronType=Dem | 4 surround | advmod |
| 19 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 23 came | punct |
| 20 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 23 came | mark |
| 21 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 22 animals | det |
| 22 | animals | animal | NOUN | Number=Plur | 23 came | nsubj |
| 23 | came | come | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 surround | parataxis |
| 24 | out | out | ADV | _ | 23 came | advmod |
| 25 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 28 killed | punct |
| 26 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 28 killed | nsubj:pass |
| 27 | were | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 28 killed | aux:pass |
| 28 | killed | kill | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 4 surround | conj |
| 29 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 surround | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | surround | past | people | a certain portion of the forest | then | vn contiguous_location-47.8 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme portion=Co-Theme | |||
| 2 | set | infinitive | people not said here | fire | to the bush | vn other_cos-45.4-1 «NP V NP ADJ»: agent=Patient fire=Result | |||
| 3 | come out | past | the animals | out property | vn become-109.1 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Patient | ||||
| 4 | kill | past · passive | people | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: subject=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/pg70959/25/35/