---
title: Once upon a time, we are told, a king grew weary of good fortune, so… — Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Musc… · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time, we are told, a king grew weary of good fortune, so he sent messengers in search of misfortune. Who acts: king. A sentence of «Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore», Chapter III. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every cl
---

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# Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore, Chapter III. MYTHOLOGICAL, part 1, sentence 102

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Once upon a time, we are told, a king grew weary of good fortune, so he sent messengers in search of misfortune.

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**Who acts:** king · **What happens:** tell, grow, send, search · **To what, where:** we, messengers, search, misfortune · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore», Chapter III. MYTHOLOGICAL, 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 (king), 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:pg22373:35:102
# text = Once upon a time, we are told, a king grew weary of good fortune, so he sent messengers in search of misfortune.
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	8	advmod	_	_
2	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
7	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux:pass	_	_
8	told	tell	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
12	grew	grow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
13	weary	weary	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	xcomp	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	fortune	fortune	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
18	so	so	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
19	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
20	sent	send	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
21	messengers	messenger	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	obj	_	_
22	in	in	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
23	search	search	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
24	of	of	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	misfortune	misfortune	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | present · passive |  | we |  |  | time | once *property* | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: subject=Recipient |
| 2 | **grow** | past | a king |  |  |  |  | weary *property* | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **send** | past | king | messengers |  | search of misfortune |  |  | vn confine-92-1 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent messenger=Theme in search=Destination |
| 4 | **search** |  |  | misfortune |  |  |  |  | nom search «act transitive»: of=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:** «Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore», Project Gutenberg book 22373 (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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