---
title: There was never a King like Solomon, Not since the world began; But… — Just so stories · tree and pragmatics
description: There was never a King like Solomon, Not since the world began; But Solomon talked to a butterfly As a man would talk to a man. Who acts: world, Solomon, man. A sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Butterfly That Stamped, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Just so stories, The Butterfly That Stamped, sentence 162

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There was never a King like Solomon, Not since the world began; But Solomon talked to a butterfly As a man would talk to a man.

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**Who acts:** world, Solomon, man · **What happens:** be, not begin, talk · **To what, where:** King

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This is a sentence of «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, The Butterfly That Stamped. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (world, Solomon, 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:pg2781:13:162
# text = There was never a King like Solomon, Not since the world began; But Solomon talked to a butterfly As a man would talk to a man.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
6	like	like	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	Solomon	Solomon	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
9	Not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	13	advmod	_	_
10	since	since	SCONJ	IN	_	13	mark	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	world	world	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nsubj	_	_
13	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	17	punct	_	_
15	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
16	Solomon	Solomon	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	17	nsubj	_	_
17	talked	talk	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
18	to	to	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	butterfly	butterfly	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	_
21	As	as	SCONJ	IN	_	25	mark	_	_
22	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nsubj	_	_
24	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	25	aux	_	_
25	talk	talk	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	advcl	_	_
26	to	to	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
27	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
28	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past |  | a King like Solomon |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **not** **begin** | past | the world |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 3 | **talk** | past | Solomon |  |  |  |  | to a butterfly | vn talk-37.5 «NP V PP.co-agent»: agent=Agent to butterfly=Co-Agent |
| 4 | **talk** | would | a man |  |  |  |  | to a man | vn talk-37.5 «NP V PP.co-agent»: agent=Agent to man=Co-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:** «Just so stories» by Rudyard Kipling, Project Gutenberg book 2781 (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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