---
title: It was a huge piece of fresh meat, and as I stared at it several mor… — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: It was a huge piece of fresh meat, and as I stared at it several more pieces rolled over the cliffs in different places. Who acts: light, I. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 14, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 14, sentence 35

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It was a huge piece of fresh meat, and as I stared at it several more pieces rolled over the cliffs in different places.

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**Who acts:** light, I · **What happens:** be, stare, roll · **To what, where:** huge piece, several more pieces, light, cliffs

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This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 14. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (light, I), 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:pg128:14:35
# text = It was a huge piece of fresh meat, and as I stared at it several more pieces rolled over the cliffs in different places.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
4	huge	huge	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
5	piece	piece	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	fresh	fresh	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	meat	meat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
11	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	13	mark	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	stared	stare	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	acl:relcl	_	_
14	at	at	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	obl	_	_
16	several	several	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
17	more	more	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	18	amod	_	_
18	pieces	piece	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	obj	_	_
19	rolled	roll	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	18	acl	_	_
20	over	over	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	cliffs	cliff	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	obl	_	_
23	in	in	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	different	different	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	amod	_	_
25	places	place	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past | light | a huge piece |  |  |  | of fresh meat | tree rules |
| 2 | **stare** | past | I | several more pieces |  | light |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **roll** | participle |  | several more pieces *not said here* |  | the cliffs |  | in different places | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP.theme V PP.source PP.trajectory PP.destination»: agent=Theme over cliff=Source in place=Trajectory |

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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:** «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 128 (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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