---
title: When birds were men, and men were birds, Pivi and Kabo lived in an i… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When birds were men, and men were birds, Pivi and Kabo lived in an island far away, called New Claledonia. Who acts: birds, men. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 19, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 19, sentence 43

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When birds were men, and men were birds, Pivi and Kabo lived in an island far away, called New Claledonia.

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**Who acts:** birds, men · **What happens:** be, live, call · **To what, where:** men, birds, island · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 19. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (birds, men), 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:pg3282:19:43
# text = When birds were men, and men were birds, Pivi and Kabo lived in an island far away, called New Claledonia.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	14	advmod	_	_
2	birds	bird	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	nsubj	_	_
3	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
7	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nsubj	_	_
8	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
9	birds	bird	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
11	Pivi	Pivi	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	Kabo	Kabo	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	conj	_	_
14	lived	live	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	island	island	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
18	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	19	advmod	_	_
19	away	away	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
21	called	call	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	17	acl	_	_
22	New	New	ADJ	NNP	Degree=Pos	23	amod	_	_
23	Claledonia	Claledonia	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	21	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	14	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past | birds | men and birds |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **is a** | past | men | birds |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **live** | past | men and birds |  |  | a island |  |  | vn lodge-46 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in island=Location |
| 4 | **call** | participle |  | a island *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn initiate\_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V»: agent=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:** «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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