---
title: Had it not been for the Dolphins, who at that time were very friendl… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: Had it not been for the Dolphins, who at that time were very friendly toward mankind and especially toward Athenians, all would have perished. Who acts: Dolphins. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Monkey and the Dolphin, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, The Monkey and the Dolphin, sentence 2

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Had it not been for the Dolphins, who at that time were very friendly toward mankind and especially toward Athenians, all would have perished.

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**Who acts:** Dolphins · **What happens:** have, not be, be, perish · **To what, where:** bound, Athenians

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, The Monkey and the Dolphin. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Dolphins), 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:pg19994:61:2
# text = Had it not been for the Dolphins, who at that time were very friendly toward mankind and especially toward Athenians, all would have perished.
1	Had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
2	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	1	obj	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	7	advmod	_	_
4	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	7	cop	_	_
5	for	for	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	Dolphins	Dolphin	PROPN	NNPS	Number=Plur	1	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
9	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	15	nsubj	_	_
10	at	at	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	that	that	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	12	det	_	_
12	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	_
13	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	cop	_	_
14	very	very	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	friendly	friendly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
16	toward	toward	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	mankind	mankind	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
19	especially	especially	ADV	RB	_	26	advmod	_	_
20	toward	toward	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
21	Athenians	Athenian	PROPN	NNPS	Number=Plur	26	nsubj:pass	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
23	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	26	nsubj:pass	_	_
24	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	26	aux	_	_
25	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	26	aux	_	_
26	perished	perish	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	15	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	1	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past |  | bound |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Patient |
| 2 | **not** **is** | participle |  |  |  |  |  | for the Dolphins | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** | past | the Dolphins |  |  |  |  | toward mankind; friendly *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **perish** | would · perfect · passive |  | Athenians |  |  |  | especially *property* | tree rules |

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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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