---
title: I had bitten the youngest of my master's sons in the leg, because he… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: I had bitten the youngest of my master's sons in the leg, because he kicked away the bone I was gnawing. ' Who acts: I, dog. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Snow Man, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Snow Man, sentence 77

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I had bitten the youngest of my master's sons in the leg, because he kicked away the bone I was gnawing. '

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**Who acts:** I, dog · **What happens:** bite, kick away, gnaw · **To what, where:** youngest, bone

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Snow Man. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, dog), 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:pg27200:169:77
# text = I had bitten the youngest of my master's sons in the leg, because he kicked away the bone I was gnawing. '
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	bitten	bite	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	youngest	young	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	3	obj	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
7	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	8	nmod:poss	_	_
8	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	's	's	PART	POS	_	8	case	_	_
10	sons	son	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nmod	_	_
11	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	leg	leg	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
15	because	because	SCONJ	IN	_	17	mark	_	_
16	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
17	kicked	kick	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
18	away	away	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	bone	bone	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	_
21	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
22	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	aux	_	_
23	gnawing	gnaw	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	17	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
25	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **bite** | past · perfect | I | the youngest of my master's sons in the leg |  |  |  |  | vn swat-18.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent young=Patient |
| 2 | **kick away** | past | dog | the bone |  |  |  | away *property* | vn split-23.2 «NP V NP apart»: agent=Agent bone=Patient |
| 3 | **gnaw** | past · progressive | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn chew-39.2 «NP V»: 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:** «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (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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