---
title: The Father then untied the bundle and gave the sticks to his Sons to… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: The Father then untied the bundle and gave the sticks to his Sons to break one by one. Who acts: Father. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Bundle of Sticks, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Bundle of Sticks, sentence 6

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The Father then untied the bundle and gave the sticks to his Sons to break one by one.

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**Who acts:** Father · **What happens:** untie, give, break · **To what, where:** bundle, sticks, Sons, one

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Bundle of Sticks. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Father), 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:pg19994:15:6
# text = The Father then untied the bundle and gave the sticks to his Sons to break one by one.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	Father	Father	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
4	untied	untie	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	bundle	bundle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	gave	give	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	sticks	stick	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
11	to	to	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	Sons	son	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obl	_	_
14	to	to	PART	TO	_	15	mark	_	_
15	break	break	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	advcl	_	_
16	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	15	obj	_	_
17	by	by	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	15	obl	_	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 | **untie** | past | the Father | the bundle |  |  | then |  | vn disassemble-23.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent bundle=Patient |
| 2 | **give** | past | the Father *not said here* | the sticks | Father's Sons |  |  |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent stick=Theme to son=Recipient |
| 3 | **break** | to-infinitive | the Father *not said here* | one |  |  |  | by one | vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer one=Patient |

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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:** «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, Project Gutenberg book 19994 (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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