Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grasshopper., sentence 58
When they reached the town, the spider told the people that the grasshopper’s dog had chased one of the chief’s cows and bitten it very badly.
Who acts: spider · What happens: reach, tell, chase, bite · To what, where: town, people, dog · Speech: someone speaks here
This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grasshopper.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (spider), 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 | _ | 3 reached | mark |
| 2 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 3 reached | nsubj |
| 3 | reached | reach | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 9 told | advcl |
| 4 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 5 town | det |
| 5 | town | town | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 reached | obj |
| 6 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 3 reached | punct |
| 7 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 8 spider | det |
| 8 | spider | spider | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 told | nsubj |
| 9 | told | tell | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 10 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 11 people | det |
| 11 | people | people | NOUN | Number=Plur | 9 told | iobj |
| 12 | that | that | SCONJ | _ | 18 chased | mark |
| 13 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 14 grasshopper | det |
| 14 | grasshopper | grasshopper | NOUN | Number=Sing | 16 dog | nmod:poss |
| 15 | ’s | 's | PART | _ | 14 grasshopper | case |
| 16 | dog | dog | NOUN | Number=Sing | 18 chased | nsubj:pass |
| 17 | had | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 18 chased | aux |
| 18 | chased | chase | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 9 told | ccomp |
| 19 | one | one | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | 18 chased | obj |
| 20 | of | of | ADP | _ | 24 cows | case |
| 21 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 22 chief | det |
| 22 | chief | chief | NOUN | Number=Sing | 24 cows | nmod:poss |
| 23 | ’s | 's | PART | _ | 22 chief | case |
| 24 | cows | cow | NOUN | Number=Plur | 19 one | nmod |
| 25 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 26 bitten | cc |
| 26 | bitten | bite | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 18 chased | conj |
| 27 | it | it | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 26 bitten | obj |
| 28 | very | very | ADV | _ | 29 badly | advmod |
| 29 | badly | badly | ADV | Degree=Pos | 26 bitten | advmod |
| 30 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 9 told | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | reach | past | spider | the town | vn body_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Agent town=Theme | ||||
| 2 | tell speech: assert | past | the spider | the people | vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Agent people=Recipient clause=Topic | ||||
| 3 | chase | past · perfect · passive | the grasshopper's dog | one of the chief's cows obj | tree rules | ||||
| 4 | bite | participle | dog | badly property | vn swat-18.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Patient |
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/pg70959/6/58/