---
title: There was once upon a time a witch, who in the shape of a hawk used… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: There was once upon a time a witch, who in the shape of a hawk used every night to break the windows of a certain village church. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), part 3, 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/pg640/24/44/)

<!-- 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 Yellow Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/) / [The Glass Mountain(16), part 3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/24/) / 44

# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Glass Mountain(16), part 3, sentence 44

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
There was once upon a time a witch, who in the shape of a hawk used every night to break the windows of a certain village church.

<!-- .vintro -->
**What happens:** be, use, break · **To what, where:** hawk, windows

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Glass Mountain(16), part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg640:24:44
# text = There was once upon a time a witch, who in the shape of a hawk used every night to break the windows of a certain village church.
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	witch	witch	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
10	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	13	nsubj	_	_
11	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	shape	shape	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	appos	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	hawk	hawk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nmod	_	_
17	used	use	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	16	acl	_	_
18	every	every	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	19	det	_	_
19	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl:unmarked	_	_
20	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
21	break	break	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	advcl	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	windows	window	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	21	obj	_	_
24	of	of	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
25	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
26	certain	certain	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	28	amod	_	_
27	village	village	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	compound	_	_
28	church	church	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	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 | **use** | participle |  | a hawk *not said here* |  |  | night |  | vn eat-39.1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **break** | to-infinitive |  | the windows of a certain village church |  |  |  |  | vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer window=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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 640 (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 43](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/24/43/)
- next →: [sentence 45](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/24/45/)
- ↑ back to [The Glass Mountain(16), part 3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/24/)