---
title: But if a suitor cannot answer my question I cut off his head and han… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But if a suitor cannot answer my question I cut off his head and hang it on the battlements of the citadel.’ Who acts: suitor, I, my. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 1, sentence 62

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But if a suitor cannot answer my question I cut off his head and hang it on the battlements of the citadel.’

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**Who acts:** suitor, I, my · **What happens:** not answer, cut off, hang, question · **To what, where:** question, head, battlements

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (suitor, I, my), 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:pg3282:1:62
# text = But if a suitor cannot answer my question I cut off his head and hang it on the battlements of the citadel.’
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
2	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	7	mark	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	suitor	suitor	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
5	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	7	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	7	advmod	_	_
7	answer	answer	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	advcl	_	_
8	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	question	question	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
10	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	cut	cut	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	off	off	ADP	RP	_	11	compound:prt	_	_
13	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	hang	hang	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	11	conj	_	_
17	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	_
18	on	on	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	battlements	battlement	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	obl	_	_
21	of	of	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	citadel	citadel	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **answer** *speech: assert* *a condition, not said to happen* | can | a suitor | my question |  |  |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent question=Eventuality |
| 2 | **cut off** | past | I | suitor's head |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: agent=Affector head=Eventuality |
| 3 | **hang** | infinitive | I *not said here* | Head |  | the battlements of the citadel |  |  | vn put\_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent it=Theme on battlement=Destination |
| 4 | **question** |  | my |  |  |  |  |  | nom question «communication transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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:** «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3282 (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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