The grateful elephant, Opening, part 4, sentence 126
But that man, that betrayer of friends, even as he sat on the back of the Future Buddha, thought: “If anybody asks me, I must be able to tell him where this elephant lives.”
Who acts: man, anybody, elephant · What happens: sit, think, ask, be, tell, live · To what, where: friends, back, man · Speech: someone speaks here
This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, anybody, elephant), 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 | But | but | CCONJ | _ | 22 thought | cc |
| 2 | that | that | DET | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 3 man | det |
| 3 | man | man | NOUN | Number=Sing | 22 thought | nsubj |
| 4 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 6 betrayer | punct |
| 5 | that | that | DET | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 6 betrayer | det |
| 6 | betrayer | betrayer | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 man | appos |
| 7 | of | of | ADP | _ | 8 friends | case |
| 8 | friends | friend | NOUN | Number=Plur | 6 betrayer | nmod |
| 9 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 13 sat | punct |
| 10 | even | even | ADV | _ | 13 sat | advmod |
| 11 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 13 sat | mark |
| 12 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 13 sat | nsubj |
| 13 | sat | sit | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 8 friends | acl:relcl |
| 14 | on | on | ADP | _ | 16 back | case |
| 15 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 16 back | det |
| 16 | back | back | NOUN | Number=Sing | 13 sat | obl |
| 17 | of | of | ADP | _ | 20 Buddha | case |
| 18 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 20 Buddha | det |
| 19 | Future | Future | PROPN | Number=Sing | 20 Buddha | compound |
| 20 | Buddha | Buddha | PROPN | Number=Sing | 16 back | nmod |
| 21 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 3 man | punct |
| 22 | thought | think | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 23 | : | : | PUNCT | _ | 22 thought | punct |
| 24 | “ | " | PUNCT | _ | 33 able | punct |
| 25 | If | if | SCONJ | _ | 27 asks | mark |
| 26 | anybody | anybody | PRON | Number=Sing PronType=Ind | 27 asks | nsubj |
| 27 | asks | ask | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 33 able | advcl |
| 28 | me | I | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 27 asks | obj |
| 29 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 27 asks | punct |
| 30 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 33 able | nsubj |
| 31 | must | must | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 33 able | aux |
| 32 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 33 able | cop |
| 33 | able | able | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 22 thought | ccomp |
| 34 | to | to | PART | _ | 35 tell | mark |
| 35 | tell | tell | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 33 able | xcomp |
| 36 | him | he | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 35 tell | iobj |
| 37 | where | where | ADV | PronType=Rel | 40 lives | advmod |
| 38 | this | this | DET | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 39 elephant | det |
| 39 | elephant | elephant | NOUN | Number=Sing | 40 lives | nsubj |
| 40 | lives | live | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 35 tell | ccomp |
| 41 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 33 able | punct |
| 42 | ” | " | PUNCT | _ | 33 able | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | sit | past | man | friends not said here | the back of the Future Buddha | vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V NP.theme PP»: agent=Agent friend=Theme on back=Location | |||
| 2 | think speech: other | past | that man | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | |||||
| 3 | ask speech: ask a condition, not said to happen, in a quote | present | anybody | that man = man | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent i=Recipient | ||||
| 4 | is in a quote | must | that man = man | able property | tree rules | ||||
| 5 | tell speech: assert in a quote | to-infinitive | that man = man not said here | man | vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP what S»: agent=Agent he=Recipient clause=Topic | ||||
| 6 | live in a quote | present | this elephant | vn exist-47.1-1 «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: «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Project Gutenberg book 74064 (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/pg74064/4/126/