---
title: ‘What can that commotion be by the pigsties?’ asked the Emperor, who… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘What can that commotion be by the pigsties?’ asked the Emperor, who was standing on the balcony. Who acts: commotion, pigsties, Emperor. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Swineherd, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Yellow Fairy Book, The Swineherd, sentence 92

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‘What can that commotion be by the pigsties?’ asked the Emperor, who was standing on the balcony.

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**Who acts:** commotion, pigsties, Emperor · **What happens:** be, ask, stand · **To what, where:** Emperor, balcony

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This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Swineherd. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (commotion, pigsties, Emperor), 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:pg640:43:92
# text = ‘What can that commotion be by the pigsties?’ asked the Emperor, who was standing on the balcony.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	12	obj	_	_
3	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
4	that	that	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	det	_	_
5	commotion	commotion	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nsubj	_	_
6	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	cop	_	_
7	by	by	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	pigsties	pigsty	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	9	punct	_	_
12	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	Emperor	Emperor	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
16	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	18	nsubj	_	_
17	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
18	standing	stand	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	14	acl	_	_
19	on	on	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	balcony	balcony	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | can | that commotion |  |  |  |  | by the pigsties | tree rules |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | the pigsties | the Emperor |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent what=Recipient |
| 3 | **stand** | past · progressive | the Emperor |  |  | the balcony |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on balcony=Location |

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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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