Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of Hlakanyana., sentence 16
The voice said again: “Bear me, mother, as all my father’s cattle are being finished, and I have not yet eaten anything of them.”
Who acts: voice · What happens: say, bear, finish, not eat · To what, where: voice, cattle, anything · Speech: someone speaks here
This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Hlakanyana.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (voice), 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 voice | det |
| 2 | voice | voice | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 said | nsubj |
| 3 | said | say | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 4 | again | again | ADV | _ | 3 said | advmod |
| 5 | : | : | PUNCT | _ | 7 Bear | punct |
| 6 | “ | " | PUNCT | _ | 7 Bear | punct |
| 7 | Bear | bear | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 3 said | ccomp |
| 8 | me | I | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 7 Bear | obj |
| 9 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 10 mother | punct |
| 10 | mother | mother | NOUN | Number=Sing | 7 Bear | conj |
| 11 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 20 finished | punct |
| 12 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 20 finished | mark |
| 13 | all | all | DET | PronType=Tot | 15 father | det:predet |
| 14 | my | my | PRON | Case=Gen Number=Sing Person=1 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 15 father | nmod:poss |
| 15 | father | father | NOUN | Number=Sing | 17 cattle | nmod:poss |
| 16 | ’s | 's | PART | _ | 15 father | case |
| 17 | cattle | cattle | NOUN | Number=Plur | 20 finished | nsubj:pass |
| 18 | are | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 20 finished | aux:pass |
| 19 | being | be | AUX | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 20 finished | aux:pass |
| 20 | finished | finish | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 7 Bear | conj |
| 21 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 27 eaten | punct |
| 22 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 27 eaten | cc |
| 23 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 27 eaten | nsubj |
| 24 | have | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 27 eaten | aux |
| 25 | not | not | PART | Polarity=Neg | 27 eaten | advmod |
| 26 | yet | yet | ADV | _ | 27 eaten | advmod |
| 27 | eaten | eat | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part | 3 said | ccomp |
| 28 | anything | anything | PRON | Number=Sing PronType=Ind | 27 eaten | obj |
| 29 | of | of | ADP | _ | 30 them | case |
| 30 | them | they | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 28 anything | nmod |
| 31 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 27 eaten | punct |
| 32 | ” | " | PUNCT | _ | 27 eaten | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | say speech: assert | past | the voice | again | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | ||||
| 2 | bear in a quote | infinitive | the voice = voice | mother conj | vn birth-28.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Patient | ||||
| 3 | finish in a quote | present · passive | my father's cattle | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: subject=Eventuality | |||||
| 4 | not eat in a quote | present · perfect | the voice = voice | anything of cattle | yet | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent anything=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: «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Project Gutenberg book 71335 (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/pg71335/10/16/