---
title: (This is a very old story: the Danes who used to fight with the Engl… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: (This is a very old story: the Danes who used to fight with the English in King Alfred’s time knew this story. Who acts: This, Danes. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Sigurd, 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/pg540/51/1/)

<!-- 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 Story of Sigurd](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/51/) / 1

# The Red Fairy Book, The Story of Sigurd, sentence 1

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
(This is a very old story: the Danes who used to fight with the English in King Alfred’s time knew this story.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** This, Danes · **What happens:** be, use, fight, know · **To what, where:** old story, story

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Sigurd. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (This, Danes), 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:pg540:51:1
# text = (This is a very old story: the Danes who used to fight with the English in King Alfred’s time knew this story.
1	(	(	PUNCT	-LRB-	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	This	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	7	nsubj	_	_
3	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
5	very	very	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	10	punct	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	Danes	Dane	PROPN	NNPS	Number=Plur	23	nsubj	_	_
11	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	12	nsubj	_	_
12	used	use	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	acl:relcl	_	_
13	to	to	PART	TO	_	14	mark	_	_
14	fight	fight	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	xcomp	_	_
15	with	with	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	English	English	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
18	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
19	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	22	nmod:poss	_	_
20	Alfred	Alfred	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	flat	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	’s	's	PART	POS	_	19	case	_	_
22	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	_
23	knew	know	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	parataxis	_	_
24	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	25	det	_	_
25	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | present | This | a old story |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **use** | past | the Danes |  |  |  |  |  | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 3 | **fight** | to-infinitive | the Danes *not said here* |  |  |  | time | with the English | vn battle-36.4-1 «NP V PP.co-agent»: agent=Agent with english=Co-Agent |
| 4 | **know** | past | the Danes | this story |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer story=Stimulus |

<!-- .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: [The Marvellous Musician, 69](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/50/69/)
- next →: [sentence 2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/51/2/)
- ↑ back to [The Story of Sigurd](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/51/)