---
title: Once upon a time, there were three Bears who lived in a castle in a… — More English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time, there were three Bears who lived in a castle in a great wood. Who acts: three Bears. A sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 9, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# More English Fairy Tales, More English Fairy Tales, part 9, sentence 16

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Once upon a time, there were three Bears who lived in a castle in a great wood.

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**Who acts:** three Bears · **What happens:** be, live · **To what, where:** castle

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This is a sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (three Bears), 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:pg14241:23:16
# text = Once upon a time, there were three Bears who lived in a castle in a great wood.
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	7	advmod	_	_
2	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
6	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	7	expl	_	_
7	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	9	nummod	_	_
9	Bears	bear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	nsubj	_	_
10	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	11	nsubj	_	_
11	lived	live	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	acl:relcl	_	_
12	in	in	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	castle	castle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
17	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	wood	wood	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | three Bears |  |  | there |  | once *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **live** | past | three Bears |  |  | a castle |  | in a great wood | vn lodge-46 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in castle=Location |

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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:** «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 14241 (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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