---
title: Such a funny thing has happened to me," said the nobleman. " — Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Such a funny thing has happened to me," said the nobleman. " Who acts: funny thing. A sentence of «Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales», The Three Brothers, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales, The Three Brothers, sentence 26

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Such a funny thing has happened to me," said the nobleman. "

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**Who acts:** funny thing · **What happens:** happen, say · **To what, where:** me, nobleman · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales», The Three Brothers. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (funny thing), 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:pg29672:18:26
# text = Such a funny thing has happened to me," said the nobleman. "
1	Such	such	DET	PDT	PronType=Ind	4	det:predet	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	funny	funny	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
5	has	have	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
6	happened	happen	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
7	to	to	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	11	punct	_	_
11	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	nobleman	nobleman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
15	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **happen** | present · perfect | such funny thing |  | me |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | past | such funny thing *not said here* | the nobleman |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent nobleman=Topic |

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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:** «Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales», Project Gutenberg book 29672 (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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