Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xii.--concerning the Okuni Witches and Cannibalism., sentence 75
Amoru told Nkanyan that when the time came he would hide under one of the beds, but the witches would run outside, and could be easily distinguished from the other people, as they would be all naked.
Who acts: Amoru, time, witches, people · What happens: tell, come, hide, run, distinguish, be · To what, where: Nkanyan · 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 (Amoru, time, witches, people), 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 | Amoru | Amoru | PROPN | Number=Sing | 2 told | nsubj |
| 2 | told | tell | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 3 | Nkanyan | Nkanyan | PROPN | Number=Sing | 2 told | iobj |
| 4 | that | that | PRON | PronType=Rel | 3 Nkanyan | dep |
| 5 | when | when | SCONJ | _ | 8 came | mark |
| 6 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 7 time | det |
| 7 | time | time | NOUN | Number=Sing | 8 came | nsubj |
| 8 | came | come | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 2 told | ccomp |
| 9 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 11 hide | nsubj |
| 10 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 11 hide | aux |
| 11 | hide | hide | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 8 came | advcl |
| 12 | under | under | ADP | _ | 13 one | case |
| 13 | one | one | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | 11 hide | obl |
| 14 | of | of | ADP | _ | 16 beds | case |
| 15 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 16 beds | det |
| 16 | beds | bed | NOUN | Number=Plur | 13 one | nmod |
| 17 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 22 run | punct |
| 18 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 22 run | cc |
| 19 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 20 witches | det |
| 20 | witches | witch | NOUN | Number=Plur | 22 run | nsubj |
| 21 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 22 run | aux |
| 22 | run | run | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 2 told | conj |
| 23 | outside | outside | ADV | _ | 22 run | advmod |
| 24 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 29 distinguished | punct |
| 25 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 29 distinguished | cc |
| 26 | could | could | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 29 distinguished | aux |
| 27 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 29 distinguished | aux:pass |
| 28 | easily | easily | ADV | _ | 29 distinguished | advmod |
| 29 | distinguished | distinguish | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 22 run | parataxis |
| 30 | from | from | ADP | _ | 33 people | case |
| 31 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 33 people | det |
| 32 | other | other | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 33 people | amod |
| 33 | people | people | NOUN | Number=Plur | 29 distinguished | obl |
| 34 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 40 naked | punct |
| 35 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 40 naked | mark |
| 36 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 40 naked | nsubj |
| 37 | would | would | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 40 naked | aux |
| 38 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 40 naked | cop |
| 39 | all | all | ADV | _ | 40 naked | advmod |
| 40 | naked | naked | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 29 distinguished | conj |
| 41 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 2 told | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | tell speech: assert | past | Amoru | Nkanyan that | vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP what S»: agent=Agent nkanyan=Recipient clause=Topic | ||||
| 2 | come | past | the time | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | |||||
| 3 | hide | would | Amoru | under one of the beds | vn concealment-16-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent under one=Location | ||||
| 4 | run | would | the witches | outside property | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | ||||
| 5 | distinguish | could · passive | from the other people; easily property | vn distinguish-23.5-1 «NP V NP.theme PP.co-theme»: from people=Co-Theme | |||||
| 6 | is | would | people | all, naked property | tree rules |
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/pg70959/9/75/