Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of Mbulukazi., sentence 20

So they went for water; but they had not reached the river when they met a company of young men with a chief’s son, who was looking for a pretty girl to be his wife.

Who acts: children, son · What happens: go, not reach, meet, look, be · To what, where: river, company, wife

This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Mbulukazi.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (children, son), 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	So	so	ADV	_	3 went	advmod
2	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 went	nsubj
3	went	go	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	for	for	ADP	_	5 water	case
5	water	water	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 went	obl
6	;	;	PUNCT	_	11 reached	punct
7	but	but	CCONJ	_	11 reached	cc
8	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	11 reached	nsubj
9	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	11 reached	aux
10	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	11 reached	advmod
11	reached	reach	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part	3 went	parataxis
12	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	13 river	det
13	river	river	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 reached	obj
14	when	when	ADV	PronType=Int	16 met	advmod
15	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	16 met	nsubj
16	met	meet	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	11 reached	advcl
17	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	18 company	det
18	company	company	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 met	obj
19	of	of	ADP	_	21 men	case
20	young	young	ADJ	Degree=Pos	21 men	amod
21	men	man	NOUN	Number=Plur	18 company	nmod
22	with	with	ADP	_	26 son	case
23	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	24 chief	det
24	chief	chief	NOUN	Number=Sing	26 son	nmod:poss
25	’s	's	PART	_	24 chief	case
26	son	son	NOUN	Number=Sing	21 men	nmod
27	,	,	PUNCT	_	30 looking	punct
28	who	who	PRON	PronType=Rel	30 looking	nsubj
29	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	30 looking	aux
30	looking	look	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	26 son	acl:relcl
31	for	for	ADP	_	34 girl	case
32	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	34 girl	det
33	pretty	pretty	ADJ	Degree=Pos	34 girl	amod
34	girl	girl	NOUN	Number=Sing	30 looking	obl
35	to	to	PART	_	38 wife	mark
36	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	38 wife	cop
37	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	38 wife	nmod:poss
38	wife	wife	NOUN	Number=Sing	34 girl	nmod
39	.	.	PUNCT	_	3 went	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	go	past	children = child		for water	vn help-72.1-2 «NP V PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent for water=Beneficiary
2	not reach	past · perfect	children = child	the river		vn body_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Agent river=Theme
3	meet	past	children = child	a company of young men with a chief's son		vn meet-36.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent company=Co-Agent
4	look	past · progressive	a chief's son		for a pretty girl	vn rummage-35.5 «NP V PP.location PP.theme»: agent=Agent for girl=Theme
5	is a	to-infinitive		man's wife	man nmod:poss	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: «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/pg71335/17/20/

🌲 Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of Mbulukazi., sentence 20

The tree

Pragmatics

Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of Mbulukazi., sentence 20