Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxxi.--chief Kekong’s Daughter ’ndere Who Married a Python., part 2, sentence 45

Aictor was a native of the Ingor country, and could not speak the Okuni language, and, at that time, the Okuni people could not understand Ingor, as they were not on friendly terms with them, so that, when the bird sang in the Ingor language, no one could understand what he said.

Who acts: Aictor, Okuni people, people, bird, one · What happens: be, not speak, not understand, not be, sing, understand · To what, where: native, Okuni language, Ingor, Ingor language · Speech: someone speaks here

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 (Aictor, Okuni people, people, bird), 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	Aictor	Aictor	PROPN	Number=Sing	4 native	nsubj
2	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 native	cop
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	4 native	det
4	native	native	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
5	of	of	ADP	_	8 country	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 country	det
7	Ingor	Ingor	PROPN	Number=Sing	8 country	compound
8	country	country	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 native	nmod
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	13 speak	punct
10	and	and	CCONJ	_	13 speak	cc
11	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	13 speak	aux
12	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	13 speak	advmod
13	speak	speak	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	4 native	parataxis
14	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	16 language	det
15	Okuni	Okuni	PROPN	Number=Sing	16 language	compound
16	language	language	NOUN	Number=Sing	13 speak	obj
17	,	,	PUNCT	_	29 understand	punct
18	and	and	CCONJ	_	29 understand	cc
19	,	,	PUNCT	_	18 and	punct
20	at	at	ADP	_	22 time	case
21	that	that	DET	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	22 time	det
22	time	time	NOUN	Number=Sing	29 understand	obl
23	,	,	PUNCT	_	22 time	punct
24	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	26 people	det
25	Okuni	Okuni	PROPN	Number=Sing	26 people	compound
26	people	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	29 understand	nsubj
27	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	29 understand	aux
28	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	29 understand	advmod
29	understand	understand	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	13 speak	conj
30	Ingor	Ingor	PROPN	Number=Sing	29 understand	obj
31	,	,	PUNCT	_	38 terms	punct
32	as	as	ADP	_	38 terms	case
33	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	38 terms	nsubj
34	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	38 terms	cop
35	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	38 terms	advmod
36	on	on	ADP	_	38 terms	case
37	friendly	friendly	ADJ	Degree=Pos	38 terms	amod
38	terms	term	NOUN	Number=Plur	29 understand	obl
39	with	with	ADP	_	40 them	case
40	them	they	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	38 terms	nmod
41	,	,	PUNCT	_	43 that	punct
42	so	so	SCONJ	_	43 that	case
43	that	that	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	38 terms	nmod
44	,	,	PUNCT	_	48 sang	punct
45	when	when	SCONJ	_	48 sang	mark
46	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	47 bird	det
47	bird	bird	NOUN	Number=Sing	48 sang	nsubj
48	sang	sing	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	43 that	conj
49	in	in	ADP	_	52 language	case
50	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	52 language	det
51	Ingor	Ingor	PROPN	Number=Sing	52 language	compound
52	language	language	NOUN	Number=Sing	48 sang	obl
53	,	,	PUNCT	_	57 understand	punct
54	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	55 one	det
55	one	one	NOUN	Number=Sing	57 understand	nsubj
56	could	could	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	57 understand	aux
57	understand	understand	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	48 sang	parataxis
58	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	60 said	obj
59	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	60 said	nsubj
60	said	say	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	57 understand	ccomp
61	.	.	PUNCT	_	4 native	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	past	Aictor	a native			of the Ingor country	tree rules
2	not speak speech: other	could		the Okuni language				tree rules
3	not understand	could	the Okuni people	Ingor		time		vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer ingor=Stimulus
4	not is	past	people				as friendly terms; with terms = term; so that	tree rules
5	sing speech: express	past	the bird		the Ingor language			vn sound_emission-43.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in language=Location
6	understand	could	no one					vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V how S_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus
7	say speech: assert	past	bird				what obj	vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent what=Topic

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/pg70959/25/45/

🌲 Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxxi.--chief Kekong’s Daughter ’ndere Who Married a Python., part 2, sentence 45

The tree

Pragmatics

Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxxi.--chief Kekong’s Daughter ’ndere Who Married a Python., part 2, sentence 45