---
title: How prettily that little thing turns round!" said the princess, and… — Grimm's Fairy Stories · tree and pragmatics
description: How prettily that little thing turns round!" said the princess, and took the spindle and began to spin. Who acts: little thing. A sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Briar Rose, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimm's Fairy Stories, Briar Rose, sentence 17

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How prettily that little thing turns round!" said the princess, and took the spindle and began to spin.

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**Who acts:** little thing · **What happens:** turn round, say, take, begin, spin · **To what, where:** princess, spindle · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Briar Rose. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (little thing), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg11027:18:17
# text = How prettily that little thing turns round!" said the princess, and took the spindle and began to spin.
1	How	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	2	advmod	_	_
2	prettily	prettily	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	advcl	_	_
3	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
4	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
5	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
6	turns	turn	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	advcl	_	_
7	round	round	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	_
10	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	princess	princess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
15	took	take	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	parataxis	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	spindle	spindle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	conj	_	_
20	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
21	spin	spin	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **turn round** | present | little thing |  |  |  |  | round *property* | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP.theme V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | past |  | the princess |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent princess=Topic |
| 3 | **take** *in a quote* | past |  | the spindle |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent spindle=Theme |
| 4 | **begin** *in a quote* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 5 | **spin** *in a quote* | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP.theme V»: agent=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.

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**Text:** «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Project Gutenberg book 11027 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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