---
title: Then the youth swung his mighty sword in the air, and with one blow… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Then the youth swung his mighty sword in the air, and with one blow cut off the serpent’s head. Who acts: youth, one blow. 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.
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Glass Mountain(16), part 3, sentence 92

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Then the youth swung his mighty sword in the air, and with one blow cut off the serpent’s head.

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**Who acts:** youth, one blow · **What happens:** swing, cut off · **To what, where:** mighty sword, air, head

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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: who acts (youth, one blow), 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:pg640:24:92
# text = Then the youth swung his mighty sword in the air, and with one blow cut off the serpent’s head.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	youth	youth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	swung	swing	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	7	nmod:poss	_	_
6	mighty	mighty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	sword	sword	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
8	in	in	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	air	air	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
13	with	with	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	15	nummod	_	_
15	blow	blow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
16	cut	cut	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	15	acl	_	_
17	off	off	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	serpent	serpent	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	’s	's	PART	POS	_	19	case	_	_
21	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **swing** | past | the youth | eye's mighty sword |  | the air | then | with one blow | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V NP.theme PP»: agent=Agent sword=Theme in air=Location |
| 2 | **cut off** | participle | one blow *not said here* | the serpent's head |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1 «NP V NP.eventuality»: agent=Affector head=Eventuality |

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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 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.

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