---
title: Within the ring, around a small drum, sat the chosen singers, noddin… — Old Indian Legends · tree and pragmatics
description: Within the ring, around a small drum, sat the chosen singers, nodding their heads and blinking their eyes. A sentence of «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, Iktomi and the Ducks, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Old Indian Legends, Iktomi and the Ducks, sentence 34

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Within the ring, around a small drum, sat the chosen singers, nodding their heads and blinking their eyes.

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**What happens:** sit, choose, nod, blink · **To what, where:** chosen singers, heads, eyes

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This is a sentence of «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, Iktomi and the Ducks. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg338:2:34
# text = Within the ring, around a small drum, sat the chosen singers, nodding their heads and blinking their eyes.
1	Within	within	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	ring	ring	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
5	around	around	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	small	small	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	drum	drum	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
10	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	chosen	choose	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	13	amod	_	_
13	singers	singer	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
15	nodding	nod	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	10	advcl	_	_
16	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	heads	head	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	obj	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	blinking	blink	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	15	conj	_	_
20	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	21	nmod:poss	_	_
21	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sit** | past |  | the chosen singers |  |  |  | within the ring | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location singer=Theme |
| 2 | **choose** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **nod** | gerund |  | singers's heads |  |  |  |  | vn wink-40.3.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent head=Patient |
| 4 | **blink** | gerund |  | singers's eyes |  |  |  |  | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent eye=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:** «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, Project Gutenberg book 338 (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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