--- title: Silent letters often show how words were said long ago: the k in «kn… — i before e, silent letters and other famous traps · tree and pragmatics description: Silent letters often show how words were said long ago: the k in «knife» was once spoken. Who acts: Silent letters. A sentence of the lesson «i before e, silent letters and other famous traps» of the english course of Mova's primary school with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/10-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps/20/) [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/) / [English](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/) / [i before e, silent letters and other f…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/10-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps/) / 20 # i before e, silent letters and other famous traps, sentence 20 Silent letters often show how words were said long ago: the k in «knife» was once spoken. **Who acts:** Silent letters · **What happens:** show, say, speak · **To what, where:** words, k · **Speech:** someone speaks here This is a sentence of the lesson «i before e, silent letters and other famous traps» of the english 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 (Silent letters), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = school:english:010-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps.lesson:20 # text = Silent letters often show how words were said long ago: the k in «knife» was once spoken. # source = school lesson (ours) # course = english # lesson = 010-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps.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): R6-punct-agree ×2 1 Silent silent ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 2 amod _ _ 2 letters letter NOUN NNS Number=Plur 4 nsubj _ _ 3 often often ADV RB _ 4 advmod _ _ 4 show show VERB VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 5 how how ADV WRB PronType=Int 8 advmod _ _ 6 words word NOUN NNS Number=Plur 8 nsubj:pass _ _ 7 were be AUX VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 8 aux:pass _ _ 8 said say VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 4 ccomp _ _ 9 long long ADV RB Degree=Pos 10 advmod _ _ 10 ago ago ADV RB _ 8 advmod _ _ 11 : : PUNCT : _ 20 punct _ _ 12 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 13 det _ _ 13 k k NOUN NN Number=Sing 20 nsubj:pass _ _ 14 in in ADP IN _ 16 case _ _ 15 « « PUNCT `` _ 16 punct _ Agree=R6-punct-agree|Haiku=13:punct 16 knife knife NOUN NN Number=Sing 13 nmod _ _ 17 » » PUNCT '' _ 16 punct _ Agree=R6-punct-agree|Haiku=13:punct 18 was be AUX VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 20 aux:pass _ _ 19 once once ADV RB NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult 20 advmod _ _ 20 spoken speak VERB VBN Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 8 conj _ _ 21 . . PUNCT . _ 4 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} No stored speech act for this sentence. | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **show** | present | Silent letters | | | | | often *property* | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic | | 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past · passive | | words | | | | ago *property* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: subject=Topic | | 3 | **speak** *speech: other* | past · passive | | the k in knife | | | | once *property* | 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. **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:english:010-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps.lesson:20`. **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): R6-punct-agree ×2. **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: [i before e, silent letters and other f…, 19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/10-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps/19/) - next →: [i before e, silent letters and other f…, 21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/10-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps/21/) - ↑ back to [the lesson](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/english/10-i-before-e-silent-letters-and-famous-traps/)