Afghanistan, sentence 107

From Wikipedia, «Afghanistan», revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, CC BY-SA 4.0. The trees and pragmatics of these pages, Mova's parse of that text, are CC BY-SA 4.0 too.

How can a small power like Afghanistan, which is like a goat between these lions [Britain and Russia] or a grain of wheat between two strong millstones of the grinding mill, stand in the midway of the stones without being ground to dust? — Abdur Rahman Khan, the "Iron Amir", in 1900

Who acts: small power · What happens: be, stand · To what, where: Britain, midway, small power

This is a sentence of the English Wikipedia article «Afghanistan». The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (small power), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

Mova's own parse. This tree may be wrong. The article's note marks are left out of the parse.

The tree

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	How	how	ADV	PronType=Int	5 power	advmod
2	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	5 power	aux
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	5 power	det
4	small	small	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 power	amod
5	power	power	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
6	like	like	ADP	_	7 Afghanistan	case
7	Afghanistan	Afghanistan	PROPN	Number=Sing	5 power	nmod
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	13 goat	punct
9	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	13 goat	nsubj
10	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	13 goat	cop
11	like	like	ADP	_	13 goat	case
12	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	13 goat	det
13	goat	goat	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 power	conj
14	between	between	ADP	_	16 lions	case
15	these	this	DET	Number=Plur PronType=Dem	16 lions	det
16	lions	lion	NOUN	Number=Plur	36 stand	obl
17	[	[	PUNCT	_	18 Britain	punct
18	Britain	Britain	PROPN	Number=Sing	36 stand	obl
19	and	and	CCONJ	_	20 Russia	cc
20	Russia	Russia	PROPN	Number=Sing	18 Britain	conj
21	]	]	PUNCT	_	20 Russia	punct
22	or	or	CCONJ	_	24 grain	cc
23	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	24 grain	det
24	grain	grain	NOUN	Number=Sing	18 Britain	conj
25	of	of	ADP	_	26 wheat	case
26	wheat	wheat	NOUN	Number=Sing	24 grain	nmod
27	between	between	ADP	_	30 millstones	case
28	two	two	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	30 millstones	nummod
29	strong	strong	ADJ	Degree=Pos	30 millstones	amod
30	millstones	millstone	NOUN	Number=Plur	26 wheat	nmod
31	of	of	ADP	_	34 mill	case
32	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	34 mill	det
33	grinding	grinding	NOUN	Number=Sing	34 mill	compound
34	mill	mill	NOUN	Number=Sing	30 millstones	nmod
35	,	,	PUNCT	_	36 stand	punct
36	stand	stand	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	13 goat	parataxis
37	in	in	ADP	_	39 midway	case
38	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	39 midway	det
39	midway	midway	NOUN	Number=Sing	36 stand	obl
40	of	of	ADP	_	42 stones	case
41	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	42 stones	det
42	stones	stone	NOUN	Number=Plur	39 midway	nmod
43	without	without	ADP	_	45 ground	case
44	being	be	AUX	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	45 ground	cop
45	ground	ground	NOUN	Number=Sing	36 stand	obl
46	to	to	ADP	_	47 dust	case
47	dust	dust	NOUN	Number=Sing	45 ground	nmod
48	?	?	PUNCT	_	36 stand	punct
49	—	-	PUNCT	_	50 Abdur	punct
50	Abdur	Abdur	PROPN	Number=Sing	5 power	conj
51	Rahman	Rahman	PROPN	Number=Sing	50 Abdur	flat
52	Khan	Khan	PROPN	Number=Sing	50 Abdur	flat
53	,	,	PUNCT	_	57 Amir	punct
54	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	57 Amir	det
55	"	"	PUNCT	_	57 Amir	punct
56	Iron	Iron	PROPN	Number=Sing	57 Amir	compound
57	Amir	Amir	PROPN	Number=Sing	50 Abdur	appos
58	"	"	PUNCT	_	57 Amir	punct
59	,	,	PUNCT	_	61 1900	punct
60	in	in	ADP	_	61 1900	case
61	1900	1900	NUM	NumForm=Digit NumType=Card	50 Abdur	list

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	is	present	a small power like Afghanistan and a goat and Abdur			like a goat	tree rules
2	stand	infinitive		Britain and Russia or a grain of wheat between two strong millstones of the grinding mill	the midway of the stones	between this lions	vn assuming_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent between lion=Location
3	is	gerund				without ground; to dust	tree rules

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 English Wikipedia, «Afghanistan», revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, CC BY-SA 4.0. Tree: Mova's own parse, CC BY-SA 4.0 as the text is. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the article read in order, CC BY-SA 4.0.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/Afghanistan/107/

🌲 Afghanistan, sentence 107

The tree

Pragmatics

Afghanistan, sentence 107