---
title: Not very far off there dwelt a man who had three oxen, one of which… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Not very far off there dwelt a man who had three oxen, one of which he was to take to the town to sell. Who acts: man. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Master Thief, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Master Thief, sentence 33

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Not very far off there dwelt a man who had three oxen, one of which he was to take to the town to sell.

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**Who acts:** man · **What happens:** not dwell, have, be, sell · **To what, where:** man, three oxen

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Master Thief. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man), 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:pg540:9:33
# text = Not very far off there dwelt a man who had three oxen, one of which he was to take to the town to sell.
1	Not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	6	advmod	_	_
2	very	very	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
3	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	4	advmod	_	_
4	off	off	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
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	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	_
9	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	10	nsubj	_	_
10	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	acl:relcl	_	_
11	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	12	nummod	_	_
12	oxen	ox	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
14	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	12	appos	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	20	obl	_	_
17	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nsubj	_	_
18	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	cop	_	_
19	to	to	PART	TO	_	20	mark	_	_
20	take	take	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	acl:relcl	_	_
21	to	to	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
24	to	to	PART	TO	_	25	mark	_	_
25	sell	sell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	20	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **dwell** | past |  | a man |  | there |  | off *property* | vn lodge-46 «NP V ADV»: agent=Theme man=Location |
| 2 | **have** | past | a man | three oxen |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent ox=Patient |
| 3 | **is** | past | man |  |  |  |  | to the town; take *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **sell** | to-infinitive | man *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V PP.recipient»: agent=Agent |

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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 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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