Colombo, sentence 6
From Wikipedia, «Colombo», 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.
It was made the capital of the island when Sri Lanka was ceded to the British Empire in 1815, retaining its capital status when Sri Lanka gained independence in 1948.
Who acts: Sri · What happens: make, cede, retain, gain · To what, where: area, Sri, British Empire, 1815, capital status, independence
This is a sentence of the English Wikipedia article «Colombo». The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Sri), 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 | It | it | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 3 made | nsubj:pass |
| 2 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 3 made | aux:pass |
| 3 | made | make | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | root | root |
| 4 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 5 capital | det |
| 5 | capital | capital | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 made | xcomp |
| 6 | of | of | ADP | _ | 8 island | case |
| 7 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 8 island | det |
| 8 | island | island | NOUN | Number=Sing | 5 capital | nmod |
| 9 | when | when | ADV | PronType=Int | 13 ceded | advmod |
| 10 | Sri | Sri | PROPN | Number=Sing | 13 ceded | nsubj |
| 11 | Lanka | Lanka | PROPN | Number=Sing | 10 Sri | flat |
| 12 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 13 ceded | aux:pass |
| 13 | ceded | cede | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 3 made | advcl |
| 14 | to | to | ADP | _ | 17 Empire | case |
| 15 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 17 Empire | det |
| 16 | British | British | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 17 Empire | amod |
| 17 | Empire | Empire | PROPN | Number=Sing | 13 ceded | obl |
| 18 | in | in | ADP | _ | 19 1815 | case |
| 19 | 1815 | 1815 | NUM | NumForm=Digit NumType=Card | 13 ceded | obl |
| 20 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 21 retaining | punct |
| 21 | retaining | retain | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 13 ceded | advcl |
| 22 | its | its | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 24 status | nmod:poss |
| 23 | capital | capital | NOUN | Number=Sing | 24 status | compound |
| 24 | status | status | NOUN | Number=Sing | 21 retaining | obj |
| 25 | when | when | ADV | PronType=Int | 28 gained | advmod |
| 26 | Sri | Sri | PROPN | Number=Sing | 28 gained | nsubj |
| 27 | Lanka | Lanka | PROPN | Number=Sing | 26 Sri | flat |
| 28 | gained | gain | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 21 retaining | advcl |
| 29 | independence | independence | NOUN | Number=Sing | 28 gained | obj |
| 30 | in | in | ADP | _ | 31 1948 | case |
| 31 | 1948 | 1948 | NUM | NumForm=Digit NumType=Card | 28 gained | obl |
| 32 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 3 made | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | make | past · passive | area | the capital of the island xcomp | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: subject=Product | ||||
| 2 | cede | past · passive | Sri | the British Empire | 1815 | vn future_having-13.3 «NP V NP PP.goal»: subject=Theme to empire=Goal | |||
| 3 | retain | gerund | area's capital status | tree rules | |||||
| 4 | gain | past | Sri | independence | in 1948 | vn calibratable_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.patient V PP.attribute NP.extent PP.source PP.goal»: agent=Patient independence=Extent in 1948=Attribute |
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, «Colombo», 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/Colombo/6/