---
title: When she had finished her bread they gave her a broom and told her t… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: When she had finished her bread they gave her a broom and told her to sweep away the snow from the back door. Who acts: stepmother, dwarfs. 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.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/37/34/)

<!-- 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 Red Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/) / [The Three Dwarfs, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/37/) / 34

# The Red Fairy Book, The Three Dwarfs, part 1, sentence 34

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
When she had finished her bread they gave her a broom and told her to sweep away the snow from the back door.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** stepmother, dwarfs · **What happens:** finish, give, tell, sweep away · **To what, where:** bread, broom, stepmother, snow, back door · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (stepmother, dwarfs), 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:pg540:37:34
# text = When she had finished her bread they gave her a broom and told her to sweep away the snow from the back door.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	4	advmod	_	_
2	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	finished	finish	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	_
5	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	bread	bread	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	gave	give	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	iobj	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	broom	broom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
14	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	iobj	_	_
15	to	to	PART	TO	_	16	mark	_	_
16	sweep	sweep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	xcomp	_	_
17	away	away	ADV	RB	_	16	advmod	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	snow	snow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	_
20	from	from	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
22	back	back	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	compound	_	_
23	door	door	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **finish** | past · perfect | stepmother | stepmother's bread |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: agent=Affector bread=Eventuality |
| 2 | **give** | past | dwarfs *= dwarf* | a broom | stepmother |  |  |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent she=Recipient broom=Theme |
| 3 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | dwarfs *= dwarf* *not said here* |  | stepmother |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent she=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 4 | **sweep away** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | dwarfs *= dwarf* *not said here* | the snow |  | the back door |  | away *property* | vn funnel-9.3-1-1 «NP V NP PP.trajectory»: agent=Agent snow=Theme from door=Trajectory |

<!-- .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 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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 33](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/37/33/)
- next →: [sentence 35](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/37/35/)
- ↑ back to [The Three Dwarfs, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/37/)