---
title: There was once upon a time a man who lost his wife, and a woman who… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: There was once upon a time a man who lost his wife, and a woman who lost her husband; and the man had a daughter and so had the woman. Who acts: man, woman. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Three Dwarfs, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Three Dwarfs, part 1, sentence 1

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
There was once upon a time a man who lost his wife, and a woman who lost her husband; and the man had a daughter and so had the woman.

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**Who acts:** man, woman · **What happens:** be, lose, have · **To what, where:** wife, husband, daughter, woman

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Three Dwarfs, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man, woman), 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:pg540:37:1
# text = There was once upon a time a man who lost his wife, and a woman who lost her husband; and the man had a daughter and so had the woman.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	2	advmod	_	_
4	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	appos	_	_
9	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	10	nsubj	_	_
10	lost	lose	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	acl:relcl	_	_
11	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
15	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	woman	woman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nsubj	_	_
17	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	18	nsubj	_	_
18	lost	lose	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	acl:relcl	_	_
19	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	husband	husband	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nsubj	_	_
25	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	parataxis	_	_
26	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	daughter	daughter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	_
28	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	30	cc	_	_
29	so	so	ADV	RB	_	30	advmod	_	_
30	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	25	conj	_	_
31	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	32	det	_	_
32	woman	woman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	30	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past |  |  |  | there | time | once *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **lose** | past | a man | man's wife |  |  |  |  | vn succeed-74-3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent wife=Eventuality |
| 3 | **lose** | past | a woman | woman's husband |  |  |  |  | vn succeed-74-3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent husband=Eventuality |
| 4 | **have** | past | a woman | a daughter |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent daughter=Patient |
| 5 | **have** | past | a woman *not said here* | the woman |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent woman=Patient |

<!-- .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 Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 540 (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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