---
title: Stories of this kind are common in all lands, but the witches about… — Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Musc… · tree and pragmatics
description: Stories of this kind are common in all lands, but the witches about whom they are told generally assume the forms of beasts of prey, especially of wolves, or of cats. Who acts: Stories, witches. A sentence of «Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore», Magic and Witchcraft., p
---

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# Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore, Magic and Witchcraft., part 5, sentence 127

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Stories of this kind are common in all lands, but the witches about whom they are told generally assume the forms of beasts of prey, especially of wolves, or of cats.

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**Who acts:** Stories, witches · **What happens:** be, tell, assume, form · **To what, where:** lands, Witches, forms, beasts · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore», Magic and Witchcraft., part 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Stories, witches), 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:pg22373:46:127
# text = Stories of this kind are common in all lands, but the witches about whom they are told generally assume the forms of beasts of prey, especially of wolves, or of cats.
1	Stories	story	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nsubj	_	_
2	of	of	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	4	det	_	_
4	kind	kind	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	nmod	_	_
5	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
6	common	common	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	9	det	_	_
9	lands	land	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
11	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	witches	witch	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	nsubj	_	_
14	about	about	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	whom	whom	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	18	obl	_	_
16	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj:pass	_	_
17	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	aux:pass	_	_
18	told	tell	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	13	acl:relcl	_	_
19	generally	generally	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
20	assume	assume	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	forms	form	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	obj	_	_
23	of	of	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
24	beasts	beast	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	22	nmod	_	_
25	of	of	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
26	prey	prey	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	_
28	especially	especially	ADV	RB	_	30	advmod	_	_
29	of	of	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
30	wolves	wolf	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	34	punct	_	_
32	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	34	cc	_	_
33	of	of	ADP	IN	_	34	case	_	_
34	cats	cat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	30	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | Stories of this kind |  |  | all lands |  | common *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | present · passive |  | Witches *= witch* |  |  |  | about the witches; generally *property* | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_ING»: subject=Recipient about whom=Topic |
| 3 | **assume** | present | the witches | the forms of beasts of prey |  |  |  | of wolves or cats | vn adopt-93.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent form=Theme |
| 4 | **form** |  |  | beasts of prey |  |  |  |  | nom form «communication transitive»: of=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:** «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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