Kaffir folk-lore, Story of the Bird That Made Milk. I., sentence 8
She began by cutting the grass with a pick, and then putting it in a big heap.
Who acts: woman · What happens: begin, cut, put · To what, where: grass, big heap
This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Story of the Bird That Made Milk. I.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (woman), 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 | She | she | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 2 began | nsubj |
| 2 | began | begin | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 3 | by | by | SCONJ | _ | 4 cutting | mark |
| 4 | cutting | cut | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 2 began | advcl |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 6 grass | det |
| 6 | grass | grass | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 cutting | obj |
| 7 | with | with | ADP | _ | 9 pick | case |
| 8 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 9 pick | det |
| 9 | pick | pick | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 cutting | obl |
| 10 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 13 putting | punct |
| 11 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 13 putting | cc |
| 12 | then | then | ADV | PronType=Dem | 13 putting | advmod |
| 13 | putting | put | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 2 began | advcl |
| 14 | it | it | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 13 putting | obj |
| 15 | in | in | ADP | _ | 18 heap | case |
| 16 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 18 heap | det |
| 17 | big | big | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 18 heap | amod |
| 18 | heap | heap | NOUN | Number=Sing | 13 putting | obl |
| 19 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 2 began | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | begin | past | woman | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality | |||||
| 2 | cut | gerund | woman not said here | the grass | with a pick | vn cut-21.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent grass=Patient with pick=Instrument | |||
| 3 | put | gerund | woman not said here | grass | a big heap | then | vn put-9.1-2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent it=Theme in heap=Destination |
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/pg71335/3/8/