---
title: He had little to bite and to break, and once when great dearth fell… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: He had little to bite and to break, and once when great dearth fell on the land, he could no longer procure even daily bread. Who acts: boy, little, great dearth. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Hansel and Gretel, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimms' Fairy Tales, Hansel and Gretel, sentence 3

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He had little to bite and to break, and once when great dearth fell on the land, he could no longer procure even daily bread.

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**Who acts:** boy, little, great dearth · **What happens:** have, bite, break, fall, procure · **To what, where:** little, land, daily bread

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This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Hansel and Gretel. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (boy, little, great dearth), 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:pg2591:20:3
# text = He had little to bite and to break, and once when great dearth fell on the land, he could no longer procure even daily bread.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	2	obj	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	bite	bite	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	break	break	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
11	once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	15	advmod	_	_
12	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	15	advmod	_	_
13	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	dearth	dearth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
15	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
16	on	on	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	land	land	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
20	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
21	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
22	no	no	ADV	RB	_	23	advmod	_	_
23	longer	long	ADV	RBR	Degree=Cmp	24	advmod	_	_
24	procure	procure	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
25	even	even	ADV	RB	_	27	advmod	_	_
26	daily	daily	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	amod	_	_
27	bread	bread	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | boy | little |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent little=Patient |
| 2 | **bite** | to-infinitive | little *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn swat-18.2 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **break** | to-infinitive | little *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Patient |
| 4 | **fall** | past | great dearth |  |  | the land |  | once *property* | vn occur-48.3 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme on land=Location |
| 5 | **procure** | could | boy | daily bread |  |  |  | long *property* | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: 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:** «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Project Gutenberg book 2591 (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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