---
title: Once upon a time, in the very middle of the middle of a large kingdo… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time, in the very middle of the middle of a large kingdom, there was a town, and in the town a palace, and in the palace a king. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 18, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/18/51/)

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# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 18, sentence 51

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Once upon a time, in the very middle of the middle of a large kingdom, there was a town, and in the town a palace, and in the palace a king.

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**What happens:** be · **To what, where:** town palace

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This is a sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 18. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg2435:18:51
# text = Once upon a time, in the very middle of the middle of a large kingdom, there was a town, and in the town a palace, and in the palace a king.
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	19	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	1	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
6	in	in	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
8	very	very	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
9	middle	middle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nmod	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	middle	middle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	large	large	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	kingdom	kingdom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
18	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	19	expl	_	_
19	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	28	cop	_	_
20	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
24	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	compound	_	_
27	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
28	palace	palace	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	33	punct	_	_
30	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	33	cc	_	_
31	in	in	ADP	IN	_	33	case	_	_
32	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	33	det	_	_
33	palace	palace	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	conj	_	_
34	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	35	det	_	_
35	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	33	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
36	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	28	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past |  | a town palace and the palace |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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:** «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 2435 (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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