English Fairy Tales, Nix Nought Nothing, sentence 48
So Nix Nought Nothing threw down the hair dagger and out of it grew as quick as lightning a thick hedge of sharp razors placed criss-cross.
Who acts: Nothing, sharp razors · What happens: throw down, grow, place · To what, where: hair dagger, criss cross
This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Nix Nought Nothing. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Nothing, sharp razors), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.
Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher. This tree is Mova's own parse (the en model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.
The tree
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | So | so | ADV | _ | 5 threw | advmod |
| 2 | Nix | Nix | PROPN | Number=Sing | 3 Nought | compound |
| 3 | Nought | nought | PRON | PronType=Neg | 4 Nothing | compound |
| 4 | Nothing | nothing | PRON | Number=Sing PronType=Neg | 5 threw | nsubj |
| 5 | threw | throw | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 6 | down | down | ADP | _ | 5 threw | compound:prt |
| 7 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 9 dagger | det |
| 8 | hair | hair | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 dagger | compound |
| 9 | dagger | dagger | NOUN | Number=Sing | 5 threw | obj |
| 10 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 14 grew | cc |
| 11 | out | out | ADP | _ | 14 grew | mark |
| 12 | of | of | ADP | _ | 13 it | case |
| 13 | it | it | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 14 grew | obl |
| 14 | grew | grow | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 5 threw | conj |
| 15 | as | as | ADV | _ | 16 quick | advmod |
| 16 | quick | quick | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 14 grew | xcomp |
| 17 | as | as | ADP | _ | 18 lightning | case |
| 18 | lightning | lightning | NOUN | Number=Sing | 16 quick | obl |
| 19 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 21 hedge | det |
| 20 | thick | thick | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 21 hedge | amod |
| 21 | hedge | hedge | NOUN | Number=Sing | 18 lightning | appos |
| 22 | of | of | ADP | _ | 24 razors | case |
| 23 | sharp | sharp | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 24 razors | amod |
| 24 | razors | razor | NOUN | Number=Plur | 21 hedge | nmod |
| 25 | placed | place | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 24 razors | acl |
| 26 | criss | criss | NOUN | Number=Sing | 28 cross | compound |
| 27 | - | - | PUNCT | _ | 26 criss | punct |
| 28 | cross | cross | NOUN | Number=Sing | 25 placed | obj |
| 29 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 5 threw | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | throw down | past | Nothing | the hair dagger | vn throw-17.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent dagger=Theme | ||||
| 2 | grow | past | Nothing not said here | of dagger; quick property | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | ||||
| 3 | place | participle | sharp razors not said here | criss cross | vn put-9.1-2 «NP V PP.destination NP»: agent=Agent cross=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: «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 7439 (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/pg7439/12/48/