---
title: ‘The old woman is right,’ said the robbers, and they ceased looking… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘The old woman is right,’ said the robbers, and they ceased looking for the finger and sat down. Who acts: old woman, robbers. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The Robber Bridegroom, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/24/43/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Grimms' Fairy Tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/) / [The Robber Bridegroom](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/24/) / 43

# Grimms' Fairy Tales, The Robber Bridegroom, sentence 43

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘The old woman is right,’ said the robbers, and they ceased looking for the finger and sat down.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** old woman, robbers · **What happens:** be, say, cease, look, sit down · **To what, where:** robbers · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The Robber Bridegroom. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (old woman, robbers), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg2591:24:43
# text = ‘The old woman is right,’ said the robbers, and they ceased looking for the finger and sat down.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	woman	woman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
5	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
6	right	right	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	_
9	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	robbers	robber	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
14	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	ceased	cease	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	parataxis	_	_
16	looking	look	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	15	xcomp	_	_
17	for	for	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	finger	finger	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
21	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	conj	_	_
22	down	down	ADP	RP	_	21	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | the old woman |  |  |  |  | right *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  | the robbers |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent robber=Topic |
| 3 | **cease** | past | robbers *= robber* |  |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Affector clause=Eventuality |
| 4 | **look** | gerund | robbers *= robber* *not said here* |  |  |  |  | for the finger | vn rummage-35.5 «NP V PP.location PP.theme»: agent=Agent for finger=Theme |
| 5 | **sit down** | past | robbers *= robber* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 42](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/24/42/)
- next →: [sentence 44](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/24/44/)
- ↑ back to [The Robber Bridegroom](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/24/)