---
title: Then Ciccu scratched his ear thoughtfully, and cried, ‘Idiot that I… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Then Ciccu scratched his ear thoughtfully, and cried, ‘Idiot that I am! Who acts: Ciccu. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 38, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 38, sentence 53

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Then Ciccu scratched his ear thoughtfully, and cried, ‘Idiot that I am!

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**Who acts:** Ciccu · **What happens:** scratch, cry · **To what, where:** ear, Idiot

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This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 38. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Ciccu), 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:pg5615:38:53
# text = Then Ciccu scratched his ear thoughtfully, and cried, ‘Idiot that I am!
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	3	advmod	_	_
2	Ciccu	Ciccu	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	scratched	scratch	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	ear	ear	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	thoughtfully	thoughtfully	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
9	cried	cry	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
11	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	Idiot	idiot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	_
13	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	15	obj	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **scratch** | past | Ciccu | Ciccu's ear |  |  | then | thoughtfully *property* | vn scribble-25.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent ear=Theme |
| 2 | **cry** *speech: express* | past | Ciccu *not said here* | Idiot |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: 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 Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 5615 (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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