---
title: Lamentations 4:19 (JPS 1917) — Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the heaven; they chased… · tree and pragmatics
description: Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the heaven; they chased us upon the mountains, they lay in wait for us in the wilderness. Who acts: pursuers. Lamentations 4:19 in JPS 1917 with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Lamentations 4:19 · JPS 1917

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Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the heaven; they chased us upon the mountains, they lay in wait for us in the wilderness.

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**Who acts:** pursuers · **What happens:** be, chase, lie · **To what, where:** us, mountains, wait, wilderness

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This is Lamentations 4:19 · JPS 1917 in the English of the Jewish Publication Society's 1917 translation, from Mova's open Bible corpus. The page gives the sentence's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies, parsed by Mova and checked by a teacher model — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (pursuers), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it. The original of the verse links back to its own tree and to the Targum.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = jps:LAM:140
# text = Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the heaven; they chased us upon the mountains, they lay in wait for us in the wilderness.
1	Our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	2	nmod:poss	_	_
2	pursuers	pursuer	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	nsubj	_	_
3	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	swifter	swift	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	0	root	_	_
5	than	than	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	eagles	eagle	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obl	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	heaven	heaven	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	_
11	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	13	punct	_	_
12	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	chased	chase	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
14	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	obj	_	_
15	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	mountains	mountain	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	obl	_	_
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
20	lay	lie	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	conj	_	_
21	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	wait	wait	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obj	_	_
23	for	for	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
24	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	22	nmod	_	_
25	in	in	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	wilderness	wilderness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: statement
- act: assert
- voice: narrator
- polarity: none
- teacher: changed polarity=none

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | Our pursuers |  |  |  |  | than the eagles of the heaven; swift *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **chase** | past | pursuers *= pursuer* | us |  | the mountains |  |  | vn chase-51.6 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent we=Theme upon mountain=Trajectory |
| 3 | **lie** | past | pursuers *= pursuer* | wait |  | the wilderness |  | for us | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location wait=Theme |

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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.

## The Hebrew of this verse {#hebrew}

<!-- .vhe dir=rtl lang=hbo -->
קַלִּ֤ים הָיוּ֙ רֹדְפֵ֔ינוּ מִנִּשְׁרֵ֖י שָׁמָ֑יִם עַל־הֶהָרִ֣ים דְּלָקֻ֔נוּ בַּמִּדְבָּ֖ר אָ֥רְבוּ לָֽנוּ׃ס

[Lamentations 4:19: the Hebrew tree, its pragmatics and the Targum →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/LAM.4.19/)

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**Source.** The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text, Jewish Publication Society, 1917, from eBible.org: public domain. Sentence `jps:LAM:140` of Mova's parse database.

**The tree and the speech act** come from Mova's cycle: the small model's draft, read by a large model as teacher, passed by Mova's gates (Elamur Cosmic License). **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the chapter read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence of the chapter.

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