---
title: Once upon a time there lived in a little village in the very middle… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time there lived in a little village in the very middle of France a widow and her only son, a boy about fifteen, whose name was Antoine, though no one ever called him anything but Toueno-Boueno. Who acts: name, Antoine. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy
---

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# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 12, sentence 6

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Once upon a time there lived in a little village in the very middle of France a widow and her only son, a boy about fifteen, whose name was Antoine, though no one ever called him anything but Toueno-Boueno.

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**Who acts:** name, Antoine · **What happens:** live, be, call, name · **To what, where:** widow, little village, Antoine, one · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 12. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (name, Antoine), 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:pg3454:12:6
# text = Once upon a time there lived in a little village in the very middle of France a widow and her only son, a boy about fifteen, whose name was Antoine, though no one ever called him anything but Toueno-Boueno.
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	6	advmod	_	_
2	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
5	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	6	advmod	_	_
6	lived	live	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	village	village	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
11	in	in	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	very	very	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
14	middle	middle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nmod	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	France	France	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	14	nmod	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	widow	widow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	22	cc	_	_
20	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nmod:poss	_	_
21	only	only	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
22	son	son	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	appos	_	_
26	about	about	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	fifteen	fifteen	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	25	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	32	punct	_	_
29	whose	whose	PRON	WP$	Poss=Yes|PronType=Rel	30	nmod:poss	_	_
30	name	name	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	32	nsubj	_	_
31	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	32	cop	_	_
32	Antoine	Antoine	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	25	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	38	punct	_	_
34	though	though	SCONJ	IN	_	38	mark	_	_
35	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	36	det	_	_
36	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	38	obj	_	_
37	ever	ever	ADV	RB	PronType=Ind	38	advmod	_	_
38	called	call	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
39	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	38	obj	_	_
40	anything	anything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	38	xcomp	_	_
41	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	42	cc	_	_
42	Toueno	Toueno	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	40	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
43	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	44	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
44	Boueno	Boueno	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	42	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
45	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **live** | past |  | a widow |  | a little village in the middle of France; there | time | once *property* | vn lodge-46 «NP V ADV»: agent=Theme widow=Location |
| 2 | **is a** | past | Antoine's name | Antoine |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **call** | past |  | no one |  |  | ever |  | vn dub-29.3.2 «NP V NP NP»: agent=Agent one=Theme he=Result |
| 4 | **name** |  | Antoine |  |  |  |  |  | nom name «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 Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3454 (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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