---
title: There was once a widow who had two daughters--one of whom was pretty… — Grimm's Fairy Stories · tree and pragmatics
description: There was once a widow who had two daughters--one of whom was pretty and industrious, while the other was ugly and idle. Who acts: widow, other. A sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Mother Holle, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimm's Fairy Stories, Mother Holle, sentence 1

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There was once a widow who had two daughters--one of whom was pretty and industrious, while the other was ugly and idle.

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**Who acts:** widow, other · **What happens:** be, have · **To what, where:** two daughters

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This is a sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Mother Holle. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (widow, other), 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:pg11027:20:1
# text = There was once a widow who had two daughters--one of whom was pretty and industrious, while the other was ugly and idle.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	2	advmod	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	widow	widow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	_
6	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	7	nsubj	_	_
7	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	acl:relcl	_	_
8	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	9	nummod	_	_
9	daughters	daughter	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	9	appos	_	_
12	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	whom	whom	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	17	obl	_	_
14	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	cop	_	_
15	pretty	pretty	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	industrious	industrious	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
19	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	23	mark	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	other	other	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	nsubj	_	_
22	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	cop	_	_
23	ugly	ugly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	2	parataxis	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
25	idle	idle	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | a widow |  |  | there |  | once *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **have** | past | a widow | two daughters |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent daughter=Patient |
| 3 | **is** | past |  |  |  |  |  | industrious, pretty *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **is** | past | the other |  |  |  |  | ugly *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **be** |  | the other *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

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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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