---
title: Mad with rage, the Lion struck fiercely at the Gnat, but only succee… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: Mad with rage, the Lion struck fiercely at the Gnat, but only succeeded in tearing himself with his claws. Who acts: Mad rage. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Lion and the Gnat, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Lion and the Gnat, sentence 5

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Mad with rage, the Lion struck fiercely at the Gnat, but only succeeded in tearing himself with his claws.

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**Who acts:** Mad rage · **What happens:** strike, succeed, tear · **To what, where:** Lion

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Lion and the Gnat. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Mad rage), 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:pg19994:39:5
# text = Mad with rage, the Lion struck fiercely at the Gnat, but only succeeded in tearing himself with his claws.
1	Mad	mad	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
2	with	with	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
3	rage	rage	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	Lion	Lion	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
7	struck	strike	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	fiercely	fiercely	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	_
9	at	at	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	Gnat	Gnat	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
14	only	only	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	succeeded	succeed	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
16	in	in	SCONJ	IN	_	17	mark	_	_
17	tearing	tear	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	15	advcl	_	_
18	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	17	obj	_	_
19	with	with	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
20	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	21	nmod:poss	_	_
21	claws	claw	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **strike** | past | Mad rage |  |  |  |  | at the Gnat; fiercely *property* | vn hit-18.1-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent at gnat=Patient |
| 2 | **succeed** | past | Mad rage *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn succeed-74-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **tear** | gerund | Mad rage *not said here* | Lion |  |  |  | with Lion's claws | vn break-45.1 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: agent=Agent himself=Patient with claw=Instrument |

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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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