---
title: He may have marvelled, looking on the bright city, with its pillars… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: He may have marvelled, looking on the bright city, with its pillars of gleaming bronze and the roofs that were painted in many colours, so that each house seemed to be covered by the spreading wings of some gigantic and gorgeous bird. Who acts: arrival, pillars, house, spreading wings. A sentence of
---

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter XI, sentence 16

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He may have marvelled, looking on the bright city, with its pillars of gleaming bronze and the roofs that were painted in many colours, so that each house seemed to be covered by the spreading wings of some gigantic and gorgeous bird.

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**Who acts:** arrival, pillars, house, spreading wings · **What happens:** marvell, look, gleam, paint, seem, cover · **To what, where:** bronze, many colours

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XI. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (arrival, pillars, house, spreading wings), 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:pg2892:24:16
# text = He may have marvelled, looking on the bright city, with its pillars of gleaming bronze and the roofs that were painted in many colours, so that each house seemed to be covered by the spreading wings of some gigantic and gorgeous bird.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	may	may	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	aux	_	_
4	marvelled	marvell	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
6	looking	look	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	conj	_	_
7	on	on	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	bright	bright	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	city	city	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
12	with	with	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	pillars	pillar	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obl	_	_
15	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
16	gleaming	gleam	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	14	acl	_	_
17	bronze	bronze	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	roofs	roof	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	conj	_	_
21	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	23	nsubj:pass	_	_
22	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	aux:pass	_	_
23	painted	paint	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	17	acl:relcl	_	_
24	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	many	many	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	26	amod	_	_
26	colours	colour	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	32	punct	_	_
28	so	so	SCONJ	IN	ExtPos=SCONJ	32	mark	_	_
29	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	28	fixed	_	_
30	each	each	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	31	det	_	_
31	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	32	nsubj	_	_
32	seemed	seem	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
33	to	to	PART	TO	_	35	mark	_	_
34	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	35	aux:pass	_	_
35	covered	cover	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	32	xcomp	_	_
36	by	by	ADP	IN	_	39	case	_	_
37	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	39	det	_	_
38	spreading	spreading	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	39	compound	_	_
39	wings	wing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	35	obl	_	_
40	of	of	ADP	IN	_	45	case	_	_
41	some	some	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	45	det	_	_
42	gigantic	gigantic	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	45	amod	_	_
43	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	44	cc	_	_
44	gorgeous	gorgeous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	42	conj	_	_
45	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	39	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
46	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **marvell** | may · perfect | arrival |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **look** | gerund | arrival *not said here* |  |  |  |  | with city's pillars; on the bright city | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent on city=Theme |
| 3 | **gleam** | gerund | city's pillars *not said here* | bronze and the roofs |  |  |  |  | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent bronze=Theme |
| 4 | **paint** | past · passive |  | bronze and the roofs |  | many colours |  |  | vn image\_impression-25.1 «NP V NP.theme PP.destination»: subject=Theme in colour=Destination |
| 5 | **seem** | past | each house |  |  |  |  |  | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Theme clause=Attribute |
| 6 | **cover** | to-infinitive · passive | the spreading wings of some gigantic bird |  |  |  |  |  | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP»: 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.

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**Text:** «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Project Gutenberg book 2892 (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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