---
title: At last their spears were broken; yet still they stood side by side,… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: At last their spears were broken; yet still they stood side by side, fighting to the last. Who acts: spears. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Brave Three Hundred., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, The Brave Three Hundred., sentence 23

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At last their spears were broken; yet still they stood side by side, fighting to the last.

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**Who acts:** spears · **What happens:** break, stand, fight · **To what, where:** last spears, side

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Brave Three Hundred.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (spears), 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:pg18442:39:23
# text = At last their spears were broken; yet still they stood side by side, fighting to the last.
1	At	at	ADP	IN	_	2	case	_	_
2	last	last	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
3	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	4	nmod:poss	_	_
4	spears	spear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nsubj:pass	_	_
5	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux:pass	_	_
6	broken	break	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	11	punct	_	_
8	yet	yet	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
9	still	still	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
10	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
12	side	side	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	_
13	by	by	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	side	side	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
16	fighting	fight	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	_
17	to	to	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	last	last	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **break** | past · passive |  | Spartans's last spears |  |  |  |  | vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient |
| 2 | **stand** | past | spears *= spear* | side |  |  | still | by side | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent side=Theme by side=Destination |
| 3 | **fight** | gerund | spears *= spear* *not said here* |  |  |  |  | to the last | vn battle-36.4-1 «NP V»: agent=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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