--- title: Real life: reading marks on shoulder blades to tell the future was a… — Just So Stories, The Cat that Walked by Himself,… · tree and pragmatics description: Real life: reading marks on shoulder blades to tell the future was a real old custom in many lands; in ancient China such «oracle bones» carry some of the oldest Chinese writing. Who acts: reading, such oracle bones. A sentence of the lesson «Just So Stories, The Cat that Walked by Himself, part 1: --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/books/93-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant/27/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Books](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/books/) / [Just So Stories, The Cat that Walked b…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/books/93-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant/) / 27 # Just So Stories, The Cat that Walked by Himself, part 1: the First Friend and the First Servant, sentence 27 Real life: reading marks on shoulder blades to tell the future was a real old custom in many lands; in ancient China such «oracle bones» carry some of the oldest Chinese writing. **Who acts:** reading, such oracle bones · **What happens:** read, tell, be, carry · **To what, where:** marks, shoulder blades, future, real old custom, many lands, some · **Speech:** someone speaks here This is a sentence of the lesson «Just So Stories, The Cat that Walked by Himself, part 1: the First Friend and the First Servant» of the books course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (reading, such oracle bones), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = school:books:093-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant.lesson:27 # text = Real life: reading marks on shoulder blades to tell the future was a real old custom in many lands; in ancient China such «oracle bones» carry some of the oldest Chinese writing. # source = school lesson (ours) # course = books # lesson = 093-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant.lesson # annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×1 1 Real real ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 2 amod _ _ 2 life life NOUN NN Number=Sing 0 root _ _ 3 : : PUNCT : _ 17 punct _ _ 4 reading read VERB VBG VerbForm=Ger 17 csubj _ _ 5 marks mark NOUN NNS Number=Plur 4 obj _ _ 6 on on ADP IN _ 8 case _ _ 7 shoulder shoulder NOUN NN Number=Sing 8 compound _ _ 8 blades blade NOUN NNS Number=Plur 4 obl _ _ 9 to to PART TO _ 10 mark _ _ 10 tell tell VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 4 advcl _ Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=8:acl 11 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 12 det _ _ 12 future future NOUN NN Number=Sing 10 obj _ _ 13 was be AUX VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 17 cop _ _ 14 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 17 det _ _ 15 real real ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 17 amod _ _ 16 old old ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 17 amod _ _ 17 custom custom NOUN NN Number=Sing 2 conj _ _ 18 in in ADP IN _ 20 case _ _ 19 many many ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 20 amod _ _ 20 lands land NOUN NNS Number=Plur 17 nmod _ _ 21 ; ; PUNCT , _ 28 punct _ _ 22 in in ADP IN _ 24 case _ _ 23 ancient ancient ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 24 amod _ _ 24 China China PROPN NNP Number=Sing 30 obl _ _ 25 such such ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 28 amod _ _ 26 « « PUNCT `` _ 28 punct _ _ 27 oracle oracle NOUN NN Number=Sing 28 compound _ _ 28 bones bone NOUN NNS Number=Plur 30 nsubj _ _ 29 » » PUNCT '' _ 28 punct _ _ 30 carry carry VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 2 parataxis _ _ 31 some some DET DT PronType=Ind 30 obj _ _ 32 of of ADP IN _ 36 case _ _ 33 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 36 det _ _ 34 oldest old ADJ JJS Degree=Sup 36 amod _ _ 35 Chinese Chinese ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 36 amod _ _ 36 writing writing NOUN NN Number=Sing 31 nmod _ _ 37 . . PUNCT . _ 2 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} No stored speech act for this sentence. | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **read** | gerund | | marks | | shoulder blades | | | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mark=Topic | | 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | to-infinitive | | the future | | | | | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent future=Recipient | | 3 | **is a** | past | reading | a real old custom | | many lands | | | tree rules | | 4 | **carry** | infinitive | such oracle bones | some | | ancient China | | | vn fit-54.3 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent some=Value in china=Location | 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. **Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:books:093-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant.lesson:27`. **The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence. See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/). - ← previous: [Just So Stories, The Cat that Walked b…, 26](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/books/93-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant/26/) - next →: [Just So Stories, The Cat that Walked b…, 28](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/books/93-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant/28/) - ↑ back to [the lesson](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/books/93-justso-cat-1-the-first-friend-and-the-first-servant/)