---
title: Then the old man told them the story of Humpty Dumpty, how he fell d… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: Then the old man told them the story of Humpty Dumpty, how he fell down stairs, and was raised up again, and married a princess. Who acts: old man, man. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Fir Tree, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Fir Tree, sentence 89

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Then the old man told them the story of Humpty Dumpty, how he fell down stairs, and was raised up again, and married a princess.

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**Who acts:** old man, man · **What happens:** tell, fall down, raise up, marry · **To what, where:** story, others, stairs, princess · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Fir Tree. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (old man, man), 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:pg27200:33:89
# text = Then the old man told them the story of Humpty Dumpty, how he fell down stairs, and was raised up again, and married a princess.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	5	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	iobj	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
9	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	Humpty	Humpty	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	compound	_	_
11	Dumpty	Dumpty	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	15	advmod	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
16	down	down	ADP	RP	_	15	compound:prt	_	_
17	stairs	stair	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
20	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	21	aux:pass	_	_
21	raised	raise	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	5	conj	_	_
22	up	up	ADP	RP	_	21	compound:prt	_	_
23	again	again	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
25	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
26	married	marry	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
27	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
28	princess	princess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | the old man | the story of Humpty Dumpty | others *= other* |  | then |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent they=Recipient story=Topic |
| 2 | **fall down** | past | man | stairs |  |  |  |  | vn become-109.1-1 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Patient stair=Result |
| 3 | **raise up** | past · passive | the old man *not said here* |  |  |  | again |  | vn put\_direction-9.4 «NP V NP» |
| 4 | **marry** | past | the old man *not said here* | a princess |  |  |  |  | vn amalgamate-22.2-3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent princess=Patient |

<!-- .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:** «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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