---
title: He was very little, and when born no bigger than one’s thumb, which… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: He was very little, and when born no bigger than one’s thumb, which made him be called Little Thumb. Who acts: scarce, one thumb. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Little Thumb, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, Little Thumb, sentence 5

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He was very little, and when born no bigger than one’s thumb, which made him be called Little Thumb.

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**Who acts:** scarce, one thumb · **What happens:** be, bear, not be, make, call · **To what, where:** scarce · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Little Thumb. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (scarce, one thumb), 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:pg503:33:5
# text = He was very little, and when born no bigger than one’s thumb, which made him be called Little Thumb.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
3	very	very	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
7	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	8	advmod	_	_
8	born	bear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	10	advcl	_	_
9	no	no	ADV	RB	_	10	advmod	_	_
10	bigger	big	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	4	conj	_	_
11	than	than	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
12	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	14	nummod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	’s	's	PART	POS	_	12	case	_	_
14	thumb	thumb	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
16	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	17	nsubj	_	_
17	made	make	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	acl:relcl	_	_
18	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	_
19	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	20	aux:pass	_	_
20	called	call	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	17	xcomp	_	_
21	Little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	Thumb	Thumb	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	20	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | scarce |  |  |  |  | little *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **bear** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn admire-31.2 «NP V that S»: agent=Experiencer |
| 3 | **not** **be** |  | scarce *not said here* |  |  |  |  | than one thumb | tree rules |
| 4 | **make** | past | one thumb | scarce |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **call** | infinitive · passive | scarce *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn initiate\_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V» |

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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 Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 503 (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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