The man who married the moon, and other Pueblo Indian folk-stories, The Brown Story-tellers, sentence 3
Long before Cadmus invented letters (and I fear Cadmus himself was as much of a myth as was his dragon’s-teeth harvest), long before there were true historians or poets, there were fairy stories and story-tellers.
Who acts: Cadmus, I, dragon’s, true historians, fairy stories · What happens: invent, fear, be · To what, where: letters, Cadmus
This is a sentence of «The man who married the moon, and other Pueblo Indian folk-stories» by Charles Fletcher Lummis, The Brown Story-tellers. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Cadmus, I, dragon’s, true historians), 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 | Long | long | ADV | Degree=Pos | 4 invented | advmod |
| 2 | before | before | SCONJ | _ | 4 invented | mark |
| 3 | Cadmus | Cadmus | PROPN | Number=Sing | 4 invented | nsubj |
| 4 | invented | invent | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 5 | letters | letter | NOUN | Number=Plur | 4 invented | obj |
| 6 | ( | ( | PUNCT | _ | 4 invented | punct |
| 7 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 9 fear | cc |
| 8 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 9 fear | nsubj |
| 9 | fear | fear | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 4 invented | conj |
| 10 | Cadmus | Cadmus | PROPN | Number=Sing | 9 fear | obj |
| 11 | himself | himself | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs Reflex=Yes | 14 much | nsubj |
| 12 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 14 much | cop |
| 13 | as | as | ADV | _ | 14 much | advmod |
| 14 | much | much | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 9 fear | obj |
| 15 | of | of | ADP | _ | 17 myth | case |
| 16 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 17 myth | det |
| 17 | myth | myth | NOUN | Number=Sing | 14 much | nmod |
| 18 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 19 was | mark |
| 19 | was | be | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 9 fear | advcl |
| 20 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 21 dragon’s | nmod:poss |
| 21 | dragon’s | dragon' | NOUN | Number=Plur | 19 was | nsubj |
| 22 | - | - | PUNCT | _ | 23 teeth | punct |
| 23 | teeth | tooth | NOUN | Number=Plur | 24 harvest | compound |
| 24 | harvest | harvest | NOUN | Number=Sing | 21 dragon’s | appos |
| 25 | ) | ) | PUNCT | _ | 24 harvest | punct |
| 26 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 30 were | punct |
| 27 | long | long | ADV | Degree=Pos | 30 were | advmod |
| 28 | before | before | SCONJ | _ | 30 were | mark |
| 29 | there | there | PRON | PronType=Dem | 30 were | expl |
| 30 | were | be | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 4 invented | conj |
| 31 | true | true | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 32 historians | amod |
| 32 | historians | historian | NOUN | Number=Plur | 30 were | nsubj |
| 33 | or | or | CCONJ | _ | 34 poets | cc |
| 34 | poets | poet | NOUN | Number=Plur | 32 historians | conj |
| 35 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 37 were | punct |
| 36 | there | there | PRON | PronType=Dem | 37 were | expl |
| 37 | were | be | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 32 historians | conj |
| 38 | fairy | fairy | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 39 stories | amod |
| 39 | stories | story | NOUN | Number=Plur | 37 were | nsubj |
| 40 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 43 tellers | cc |
| 41 | story | story | NOUN | Number=Sing | 43 tellers | compound |
| 42 | - | - | PUNCT | _ | 41 story | punct |
| 43 | tellers | teller | NOUN | Number=Plur | 39 stories | conj |
| 44 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 invented | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | invent | past | Cadmus | letters | long property | vn create-26.4-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent letter=Result | |||
| 2 | fear | present | I | Cadmus | vn admire-31.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer cadmus=Stimulus | ||||
| 3 | is | past | Cadmus | of a myth; much property | tree rules | ||||
| 4 | be | past | Cadmus's dragon’s | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | |||||
| 5 | be | past | true historians or poets | there | long property | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | |||
| 6 | be | past | fairy stories and story tellers | there | vn exist-47.1 «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 man who married the moon, and other Pueblo Indian folk-stories» by Charles Fletcher Lummis, Project Gutenberg book 77804 (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/pg77804/2/3/