---
title: And so they let him go; for they knew that a great Roman would keep… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: And so they let him go; for they knew that a great Roman would keep his word. Who acts: Romans, Regulus, great Roman. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Story of Regulus., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, The Story of Regulus., sentence 19

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And so they let him go; for they knew that a great Roman would keep his word.

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**Who acts:** Romans, Regulus, great Roman · **What happens:** let, go, know, keep, word · **To what, where:** Regulus, word

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Story of Regulus.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Romans, Regulus, great Roman), 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:pg18442:28:19
# text = And so they let him go; for they knew that a great Roman would keep his word.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	so	so	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
3	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	let	let	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	10	mark	_	_
9	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
10	knew	know	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
11	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	Roman	Roman	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	16	nsubj	_	_
15	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	keep	keep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	advcl	_	_
17	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	word	word	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **let** | present | Romans *= roman* | Regulus |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **go** | infinitive | Regulus *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **know** | past | Romans *= roman* |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 4 | **keep** | would | a great Roman | Regulus's word |  |  |  |  | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent word=Theme |
| 5 | **word** |  | Regulus |  |  |  |  |  | nom word «communication transitive»: poss=agent |

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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:** «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 18442 (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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