Gleanings from Chinese folklore, T’ang Sung’s Journey to Get the Buddhist Classics, sentence 44
They heard him say, “In the past I have taken the boy first, but to-night I shall eat the girl first.”
Who acts: caravans, door, Sun · What happens: hear, say, take, eat · To what, where: door, boy, past, girl · Speech: someone speaks here
This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, T’ang Sung’s Journey to Get the Buddhist Classics. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (caravans, door, Sun), 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 | They | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 2 heard | nsubj |
| 2 | heard | hear | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 3 | him | he | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 2 heard | obj |
| 4 | say | say | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 2 heard | xcomp |
| 5 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 12 taken | punct |
| 6 | “ | " | PUNCT | _ | 12 taken | punct |
| 7 | In | in | ADP | _ | 9 past | case |
| 8 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 9 past | det |
| 9 | past | past | NOUN | Number=Sing | 12 taken | obl |
| 10 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 12 taken | nsubj |
| 11 | have | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 12 taken | aux |
| 12 | taken | take | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part | 2 heard | conj |
| 13 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 14 boy | det |
| 14 | boy | boy | NOUN | Number=Sing | 12 taken | obj |
| 15 | first | first | ADV | NumForm=Word NumType=Ord | 12 taken | advmod |
| 16 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 23 eat | punct |
| 17 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 23 eat | cc |
| 18 | to | to | ADP | _ | 20 night | case |
| 19 | - | - | PUNCT | _ | 18 to | punct |
| 20 | night | night | NOUN | Number=Sing | 23 eat | obl |
| 21 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 23 eat | nsubj |
| 22 | shall | shall | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 23 eat | aux |
| 23 | eat | eat | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 2 heard | parataxis |
| 24 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 25 girl | det |
| 25 | girl | girl | NOUN | Number=Sing | 23 eat | obj |
| 26 | first | first | ADV | NumForm=Word NumType=Ord | 23 eat | advmod |
| 27 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 23 eat | punct |
| 28 | ” | " | PUNCT | _ | 2 heard | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | hear | past | caravans = caravan | door | tree rules | ||||
| 2 | say speech: assert | infinitive | door not said here | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent | |||||
| 3 | take in a quote | present · perfect | Sun | the boy | the past | first property | vn fit-54.3 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent boy=Value in past=Location | ||
| 4 | eat in a quote | shall | Sun | the girl | night | first property | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent girl=Patient |
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: «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (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/pg75089/16/44/