---
title: Now, there was in the town of Can'ter-bur-y a rich old abbot who liv… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: Now, there was in the town of Can'ter-bur-y a rich old abbot who lived in grand style in a great house called the Abbey. Who acts: rich old abbot. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, I. the Three Questions., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, I. the Three Questions., sentence 4

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Now, there was in the town of Can'ter-bur-y a rich old abbot who lived in grand style in a great house called the Abbey.

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**Who acts:** rich old abbot · **What happens:** be, live, call · **To what, where:** town, grand style, great house · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, I. the Three Questions.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (rich old abbot), 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:pg18442:9:4
# text = Now, there was in the town of Can'ter-bur-y a rich old abbot who lived in grand style in a great house called the Abbey.
1	Now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	4	expl	_	_
4	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	in	in	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
9	Can'ter	Can'ter	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	bur	bur	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	y	y	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	conj	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
15	rich	rich	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
16	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	abbot	abbot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	conj	_	_
18	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	19	nsubj	_	_
19	lived	live	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	acl:relcl	_	_
20	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
21	grand	grand	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	style	style	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
23	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
25	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	amod	_	_
26	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
27	called	call	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	26	acl	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	Abbey	Abbey	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	27	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past |  |  |  | the town of Can'ter bur and a rich old abbot; there | now |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in town=Location |
| 2 | **live** | past | a rich old abbot |  |  | grand style |  | in a great house | vn lodge-46 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in style=Location |
| 3 | **call** | participle |  | a great house *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn initiate\_communication-37.4.2-1 «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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