Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II., sentence 81

When he approached they scattered some more roots upon the ground, and while he was picking them up and eating, they fled.

Who acts: cannibal, roots · What happens: approach, scatter, pick up, eat, flee · To what, where: more roots, ground, roots

This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (cannibal, roots), 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	When	when	ADV	PronType=Int	3 approached	advmod
2	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 approached	nsubj
3	approached	approach	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 scattered	advcl
4	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	5 scattered	nsubj
5	scattered	scatter	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
6	some	some	DET	PronType=Ind	8 roots	det
7	more	more	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	8 roots	amod
8	roots	root	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 scattered	obj
9	upon	upon	ADP	_	11 ground	case
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	11 ground	det
11	ground	ground	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 roots	nmod
12	,	,	PUNCT	_	24 fled	punct
13	and	and	CCONJ	_	24 fled	cc
14	while	while	SCONJ	_	17 picking	mark
15	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	17 picking	nsubj
16	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	17 picking	aux
17	picking	pick	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	24 fled	advcl
18	them	they	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	17 picking	obj
19	up	up	ADP	_	17 picking	compound:prt
20	and	and	CCONJ	_	21 eating	cc
21	eating	eat	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	17 picking	conj
22	,	,	PUNCT	_	17 picking	punct
23	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	24 fled	nsubj
24	fled	flee	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 scattered	conj
25	.	.	PUNCT	_	5 scattered	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	roles by
1	approach	past	cannibal			vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	scatter	past	roots = root	some more roots	the ground	vn spray-9.7-1 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent root=Theme upon ground=Destination
3	pick up	past · progressive	cannibal	roots = root		vn discover-84-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Topic
4	eat	gerund	cannibal not said here			vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
5	flee	past	roots = root			vn escape-51.1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

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/pg71335/4/81/

🌲 Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II., sentence 81

The tree

Pragmatics

Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II., sentence 81