---
title: But the merchant said, ‘that can never be true; he must be a fine ki… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: But the merchant said, ‘that can never be true; he must be a fine king truly who travels about in a shepherd’s frock!’ Who acts: merchant, that, fine king. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The King of the Golden Mountain, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause
---

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# Grimms' Fairy Tales, The King of the Golden Mountain, sentence 59

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But the merchant said, ‘that can never be true; he must be a fine king truly who travels about in a shepherd’s frock!’

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**Who acts:** merchant, that, fine king · **What happens:** say, not be, be, travel · **To what, where:** fine king, frock · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The King of the Golden Mountain. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (merchant, that, fine 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:pg2591:51:59
# text = But the merchant said, ‘that can never be true; he must be a fine king truly who travels about in a shepherd’s frock!’
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	merchant	merchant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
6	‘	‘	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	11	nsubj	_	_
8	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
9	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	11	advmod	_	_
10	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	cop	_	_
11	true	true	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
13	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
14	must	must	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
15	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	cop	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
17	fine	fine	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nsubj	_	_
19	truly	truly	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	_
20	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	21	nsubj	_	_
21	travels	travel	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	parataxis	_	_
22	about	about	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	_
23	in	in	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	shepherd	shepherd	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	’s	's	PART	POS	_	25	case	_	_
27	frock	frock	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the merchant |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **not** **is** | can | that |  |  |  |  | true *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **is a** | must | merchant | a fine king |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **travel** | present | a fine king |  |  | a shepherd's frock |  | about, truly *property* | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in frock=Trajectory |

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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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