Morien: A Metrical Romance Rendered into English Prose from the Mediæval Dutch, Opening, part 2, sentence 20
And though I betook me to arms they profited me not a jot; his blows were so heavy, they weighed even as lead.
Who acts: I, arms, blows, knight · What happens: betake, not profit, be, weigh, blow · To what, where: me, lead
This is a sentence of «Morien: A Metrical Romance Rendered into English Prose from the Mediæval Dutch» by Jessie L. Weston, Opening, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, arms, blows, knight), 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 | And | and | CCONJ | _ | 9 profited | cc |
| 2 | though | though | SCONJ | _ | 4 betook | mark |
| 3 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 4 betook | nsubj |
| 4 | betook | betake | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 9 profited | advcl |
| 5 | me | I | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 4 betook | obj |
| 6 | to | to | ADP | _ | 7 arms | case |
| 7 | arms | arm | NOUN | Number=Plur | 4 betook | obl |
| 8 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 9 profited | nsubj |
| 9 | profited | profit | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 10 | me | I | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 9 profited | obj |
| 11 | not | not | PART | Polarity=Neg | 9 profited | advmod |
| 12 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 13 jot | det |
| 13 | jot | jot | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 profited | obl |
| 14 | ; | ; | PUNCT | _ | 19 heavy | punct |
| 15 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 16 blows | nmod:poss |
| 16 | blows | blow | NOUN | Number=Plur | 19 heavy | nsubj |
| 17 | were | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 19 heavy | cop |
| 18 | so | so | ADV | _ | 19 heavy | advmod |
| 19 | heavy | heavy | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 9 profited | parataxis |
| 20 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 22 weighed | punct |
| 21 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 22 weighed | nsubj |
| 22 | weighed | weigh | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 19 heavy | conj |
| 23 | even | even | ADV | _ | 25 lead | advmod |
| 24 | as | as | ADP | _ | 25 lead | case |
| 25 | lead | lead | NOUN | Number=Sing | 22 weighed | obj |
| 26 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 9 profited | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | betake | past | I | me | to arms | tree rules | |||
| 2 | not profit | past | arms = arm | me | a jot obl | vn benefit-72.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Causer i=Beneficiary | |||
| 3 | is | past | knight's blows | heavy property | tree rules | ||||
| 4 | weigh | past | arms = arm | lead | vn register-54.1-2-1 «NP V NP.value»: agent=Theme lead=Value | ||||
| 5 | blow | knight | nom blow «act intransitive»: poss=agent |
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: «Morien: A Metrical Romance Rendered into English Prose from the Mediæval Dutch» by Jessie L. Weston, Project Gutenberg book 8447 (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/pg8447/2/20/