---
title: Once upon a time there dwelt in the land of Erin a young man who was… — The Lilac Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time there dwelt in the land of Erin a young man who was seeking a wife, and of all the maidens round about none pleased him as well as the only daughter of a farmer. Who acts: young man. A sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 36, with its depende
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/36/17/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Lilac Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/) / [The Lilac Fairy Book, part 36](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/36/) / 17

# The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 36, sentence 17

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Once upon a time there dwelt in the land of Erin a young man who was seeking a wife, and of all the maidens round about none pleased him as well as the only daughter of a farmer.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** young man · **What happens:** dwell, seek · **To what, where:** young man, land, wife

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 36. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (young man), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg3454:36:17
# text = Once upon a time there dwelt in the land of Erin a young man who was seeking a wife, and of all the maidens round about none pleased him as well as the only daughter of a farmer.
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	dwelt	dwell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	land	land	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	Erin	Erin	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	young	young	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	_
15	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	17	nsubj	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
17	seeking	seek	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	14	acl:relcl	_	_
18	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
22	of	of	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
23	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	25	det:predet	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	maidens	maiden	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	conj	_	_
26	round	round	ADV	RB	_	25	advmod	_	_
27	about	about	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	none	none	PRON	NN	PronType=Neg	29	nsubj	_	_
29	pleased	pleased	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	nmod	_	_
30	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	29	nsubj	_	_
31	as	as	ADV	RB	ExtPos=CCONJ	36	cc	_	_
32	well	well	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	31	fixed	_	_
33	as	as	ADP	IN	_	31	fixed	_	_
34	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	36	det	_	_
35	only	only	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	36	amod	_	_
36	daughter	daughter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	conj	_	_
37	of	of	ADP	IN	_	39	case	_	_
38	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	39	det	_	_
39	farmer	farmer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	36	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
40	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **dwell** | past |  | a young man |  | the land of Erin; there | time | once *property* | vn lodge-46 «NP V ADV»: agent=Theme man=Location |
| 2 | **seek** | past · progressive | a young man | a wife |  |  |  |  | vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent wife=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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/36/16/)
- next →: [sentence 18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/36/18/)
- ↑ back to [The Lilac Fairy Book, part 36](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3454/36/)