Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xii.--concerning the Okuni Witches and Cannibalism., sentence 31
The chief then knew that his wife would not bear any more children.
Who acts: chief, wife · What happens: know, not bear · To what, where: children · Speech: someone speaks here
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 (chief, wife), 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 | The | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 2 chief | det |
| 2 | chief | chief | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 knew | nsubj |
| 3 | then | then | ADV | PronType=Dem | 4 knew | advmod |
| 4 | knew | know | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | that | that | SCONJ | _ | 10 bear | mark |
| 6 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 7 wife | nmod:poss |
| 7 | wife | wife | NOUN | Number=Sing | 10 bear | nsubj |
| 8 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 10 bear | aux |
| 9 | not | not | PART | Polarity=Neg | 10 bear | advmod |
| 10 | bear | bear | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 4 knew | ccomp |
| 11 | any | any | ADV | _ | 12 more | advmod |
| 12 | more | more | ADV | Degree=Cmp | 13 children | advmod |
| 13 | children | child | NOUN | Number=Plur | 10 bear | obj |
| 14 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 knew | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | know | past | the chief | then | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V S_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus | ||||
| 2 | not bear | would | chief's wife | children | vn birth-28.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent child=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/pg70959/9/31/