Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xii.--concerning the Okuni Witches and Cannibalism., sentence 110

It was kept there for three days, and the chiefs sat round the dead body and eat their food, but each mouthful was first offered to the dead man to eat.

Who acts: chiefs · What happens: keep, sit, eat, offer · To what, where: body, food, mouthful, dead man

This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xii.--concerning the Okuni Witches and Cannibalism.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (chiefs), 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	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 kept	nsubj:pass
2	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 kept	aux:pass
3	kept	keep	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
4	there	there	ADV	PronType=Dem	3 kept	advmod
5	for	for	ADP	_	7 days	case
6	three	three	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	7 days	nummod
7	days	day	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 kept	obl
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	12 sat	punct
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	12 sat	cc
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 chiefs	det
11	chiefs	chief	NOUN	Number=Plur	12 sat	nsubj
12	sat	sit	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 kept	parataxis
13	round	round	ADP	_	16 body	case
14	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	16 body	det
15	dead	dead	ADJ	Degree=Pos	16 body	amod
16	body	body	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 sat	obl
17	and	and	CCONJ	_	18 eat	cc
18	eat	eat	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	12 sat	conj
19	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	20 food	nmod:poss
20	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	18 eat	obj
21	,	,	PUNCT	_	27 offered	punct
22	but	but	CCONJ	_	27 offered	cc
23	each	each	DET	PronType=Tot	24 mouthful	det
24	mouthful	mouthful	NOUN	Number=Sing	27 offered	nsubj:pass
25	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	27 offered	aux:pass
26	first	first	ADV	NumForm=Word NumType=Ord	27 offered	advmod
27	offered	offer	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	3 kept	conj
28	to	to	ADP	_	31 man	case
29	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	31 man	det
30	dead	dead	ADJ	Degree=Pos	31 man	amod
31	man	man	NOUN	Number=Sing	27 offered	obl
32	to	to	PART	_	33 eat	mark
33	eat	eat	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	31 man	acl
34	.	.	PUNCT	_	3 kept	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	keep	past · passive		body		there	day		vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme
2	sit	past	the chiefs					round the dead body	vn assuming_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent
3	eat	present	the chiefs not said here	wives's food					vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent food=Patient
4	offer	past · passive		each mouthful	the dead man			first property	vn future_having-13.3 «NP V NP PP.goal»: subject=Theme to man=Goal
5	eat	to-infinitive							vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

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/pg70959/9/110/

🌲 Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xii.--concerning the Okuni Witches and Cannibalism., sentence 110

The tree

Pragmatics

Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xii.--concerning the Okuni Witches and Cannibalism., sentence 110