Folk tales from Tibet, The Story of the Boy With the Deformed Head., sentence 1
Once upon a time there lived a poor man and his wife who had only one child, and this Boy, as it happened, was born with a deformed head, which projected in front and behind, and gave him a very ugly appearance.
Who acts: wife, it · What happens: live, have, happen, bear, deform, project · To what, where: poor man, one child, front, ugly appearance, child
This is a sentence of «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, The Story of the Boy With the Deformed Head.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wife, it), 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 | Once | once | ADV | NumForm=Word NumType=Mult | 6 lived | advmod |
| 2 | upon | upon | ADP | _ | 4 time | case |
| 3 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 4 time | det |
| 4 | time | time | NOUN | Number=Sing | 6 lived | obl |
| 5 | there | there | ADV | PronType=Dem | 6 lived | advmod |
| 6 | lived | live | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 7 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 9 man | det |
| 8 | poor | poor | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 9 man | amod |
| 9 | man | man | NOUN | Number=Sing | 6 lived | obj |
| 10 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 12 wife | cc |
| 11 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 12 wife | nmod:poss |
| 12 | wife | wife | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 man | conj |
| 13 | who | who | PRON | PronType=Rel | 14 had | nsubj |
| 14 | had | have | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 12 wife | acl:relcl |
| 15 | only | only | ADV | _ | 16 one | advmod |
| 16 | one | one | NUM | NumForm=Word NumType=Card | 17 child | nummod |
| 17 | child | child | NOUN | Number=Sing | 14 had | obj |
| 18 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 21 Boy | punct |
| 19 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 21 Boy | cc |
| 20 | this | this | DET | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 21 Boy | det |
| 21 | Boy | Boy | PROPN | Number=Sing | 6 lived | obl |
| 22 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 25 happened | punct |
| 23 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 25 happened | mark |
| 24 | it | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 25 happened | nsubj |
| 25 | happened | happen | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 6 lived | conj |
| 26 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 28 born | punct |
| 27 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 28 born | aux:pass |
| 28 | born | bear | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 25 happened | xcomp |
| 29 | with | with | ADP | _ | 32 head | case |
| 30 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 32 head | det |
| 31 | deformed | deform | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 32 head | amod |
| 32 | head | head | NOUN | Number=Sing | 28 born | obl |
| 33 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 35 projected | punct |
| 34 | which | which | PRON | PronType=Rel | 35 projected | nsubj |
| 35 | projected | project | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 28 born | parataxis |
| 36 | in | in | ADP | _ | 37 front | case |
| 37 | front | front | NOUN | Number=Sing | 35 projected | obl |
| 38 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 39 behind | cc |
| 39 | behind | behind | ADV | _ | 35 projected | conj |
| 40 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 42 gave | punct |
| 41 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 42 gave | cc |
| 42 | gave | give | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 6 lived | conj |
| 43 | him | he | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 42 gave | iobj |
| 44 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 47 appearance | det |
| 45 | very | very | ADV | _ | 46 ugly | advmod |
| 46 | ugly | ugly | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 47 appearance | amod |
| 47 | appearance | appearance | NOUN | Number=Sing | 42 gave | obj |
| 48 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 6 lived | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | live | past | a poor man and his wife | there | time | this Boy obl; once property | vn lodge-46 «NP V ADV»: agent=Theme man=Location | ||
| 2 | have | past | his wife | one child | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent child=Patient | ||||
| 3 | happen | past | it | tree rules | |||||
| 4 | bear | past · passive | with a deformed head | vn admire-31.2 «NP V that S» | |||||
| 5 | deform | participle | vn turn-26.6.1 «NP V»: agent=Patient | ||||||
| 6 | project | past | front | which nsubj | vn spatial_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in front=Location | ||||
| 7 | give | past | a ugly appearance | child | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent he=Recipient appearance=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: «Folk tales from Tibet» by William Frederick Travers, Sir O'Connor, Project Gutenberg book 75000 (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/pg75000/16/1/