---
title: For a time he had trembled on the high pedestal on which he had plac… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: For a time he had trembled on the high pedestal on which he had placed himself, till at last he toppled over, and ruin came. Who acts: wealth, ruin. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Ib and Little Christina, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/51/193/)

<!-- 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/) / [Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/) / [Ib and Little Christina](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/51/) / 193

# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, Ib and Little Christina, sentence 193

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
For a time he had trembled on the high pedestal on which he had placed himself, till at last he toppled over, and ruin came.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** wealth, ruin · **What happens:** tremble, place, topple over, come · **To what, where:** high pedestal, wealth

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Ib and Little Christina. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wealth, ruin), 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:pg27200:51:193
# text = For a time he had trembled on the high pedestal on which he had placed himself, till at last he toppled over, and ruin came.
1	For	for	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
5	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
6	trembled	tremble	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
7	on	on	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	high	high	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	pedestal	pedestal	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
11	on	on	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	15	obl	_	_
13	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
14	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
15	placed	place	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	10	acl:relcl	_	_
16	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
18	till	till	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	at	at	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	last	last	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	_
21	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
22	toppled	topple	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	parataxis	_	_
23	over	over	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
25	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
26	ruin	ruin	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nsubj	_	_
27	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	22	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tremble** | past · perfect | wealth |  |  | the high pedestal | time |  | vn modes\_of\_being\_with\_motion-47.3 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on pedestal=Location |
| 2 | **place** | past · perfect | wealth | wealth |  | the high pedestal |  |  | vn put-9.1-2 «NP V PP.destination NP»: agent=Agent himself=Theme on which=Destination |
| 3 | **topple over** | past | wealth |  |  |  | till last | over *property* | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 4 | **come** | past | ruin |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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:** «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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 192](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/51/192/)
- next →: [sentence 194](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/51/194/)
- ↑ back to [Ib and Little Christina](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/51/)