---
title: A FATHER had a family of sons who were perpetually quarreling among… — Three hundred Aesop’s fables · tree and pragmatics
description: A FATHER had a family of sons who were perpetually quarreling among themselves. Who acts: FATHER, sons. A sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Three hundred Aesop’s fables, Aesop’s Fables, part 1, sentence 28

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A FATHER had a family of sons who were perpetually quarreling among themselves.

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**Who acts:** FATHER, sons · **What happens:** have, quarrel · **To what, where:** family

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This is a sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (FATHER, sons), 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:pg21:3:28
# text = A FATHER had a family of sons who were perpetually quarreling among themselves.
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	FATHER	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	family	family	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	sons	son	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nmod	_	_
8	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	11	nsubj	_	_
9	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
10	perpetually	perpetually	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	quarreling	quarrel	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	7	acl:relcl	_	_
12	among	among	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | a FATHER | a family of sons |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent family=Patient |
| 2 | **quarrel** | past · progressive | sons |  |  |  |  | among Father; perpetually *property* | vn battle-36.4 «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:** «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Project Gutenberg book 21 (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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