---
title: She flung herself on her knees to implore mercy, but he cut her in f… — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: She flung herself on her knees to implore mercy, but he cut her in four pieces. Who acts: slave, crone. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 21, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/21/55/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Arabian Nights Entertainments](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/) / [Opening, part 21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/21/) / 55

# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 21, sentence 55

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
She flung herself on her knees to implore mercy, but he cut her in four pieces.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** slave, crone · **What happens:** fling, implore, cut · **To what, where:** slave, knees, mercy, four pieces

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 21. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (slave, crone), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg128:21:55
# text = She flung herself on her knees to implore mercy, but he cut her in four pieces.
1	She	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	flung	fling	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	herself	herself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	2	obj	_	_
4	on	on	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	knees	knee	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	obl	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	implore	implore	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	advcl	_	_
9	mercy	mercy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
11	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
12	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	cut	cut	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
14	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	obj	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	four	four	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	17	nummod	_	_
17	pieces	piece	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **fling** | past | slave | slave |  | slave's knees |  |  | vn throw-17.1-1 «NP V NP PP.destinations»: agent=Agent herself=Theme on knee=Destination |
| 2 | **implore** | to-infinitive | slave *not said here* | mercy |  |  |  |  | vn urge-58.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mercy=Recipient |
| 3 | **cut** | past | crone | slave |  | four pieces |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=Product |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 54](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/21/54/)
- next →: [sentence 56](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/21/56/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/21/)