---
title: They had not gone far before they saw the owner of the axe pursuing… — Three hundred Aesop’s fables · tree and pragmatics
description: They had not gone far before they saw the owner of the axe pursuing them, and he who had picked up the axe said, “We are undone.” Who acts: friend, axe. A sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 6, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Three hundred Aesop’s fables, Aesop’s Fables, part 6, sentence 40

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They had not gone far before they saw the owner of the axe pursuing them, and he who had picked up the axe said, “We are undone.”

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**Who acts:** friend, axe · **What happens:** not go, see, pursue, pick up, say, undo · **To what, where:** owner, friend, man, We · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Three hundred Aesop’s fables» by Aesop, Aesop’s Fables, part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (friend, axe), 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:pg21:8:40
# text = They had not gone far before they saw the owner of the axe pursuing them, and he who had picked up the axe said, “We are undone.”
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	4	advmod	_	_
4	gone	go	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	4	advmod	_	_
6	before	before	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
7	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	advcl	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	owner	owner	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	axe	axe	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nmod	_	_
14	pursuing	pursue	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	13	acl	_	_
15	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
18	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj:pass	_	_
19	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	21	nsubj	_	_
20	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
21	picked	pick	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	conj	_	_
22	up	up	ADP	RP	_	21	compound:prt	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	axe	axe	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nsubj	_	_
25	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	21	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	_
27	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	30	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	We	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	30	nsubj	_	_
29	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	30	aux:pass	_	_
30	undone	undo	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **go** | past · perfect | friend |  |  |  |  | far *property* | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **see** | past | friend | the owner of the axe |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer owner=Stimulus |
| 3 | **pursue** | gerund | the axe *not said here* | friend |  |  |  |  | vn chase-51.6 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |
| 4 | **pick up** | past · perfect · passive |  | man |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Topic |
| 5 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the axe |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 6 | **undo** *in a quote* | present · passive |  | We |  |  |  |  | vn destroy-44 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient |

<!-- .note -->
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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