---
title: The sultan answered politely, and inquired where it had left its mas… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The sultan answered politely, and inquired where it had left its master, whom it had promised to bring back. Who acts: sultan. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of a Gazelle, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Story of a Gazelle, sentence 63

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The sultan answered politely, and inquired where it had left its master, whom it had promised to bring back.

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**Who acts:** sultan · **What happens:** answer, inquire, leave, promise, bring back · **To what, where:** court · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of a Gazelle. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sultan), 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:pg641:15:63
# text = The sultan answered politely, and inquired where it had left its master, whom it had promised to bring back.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	sultan	sultan	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	politely	politely	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
7	inquired	inquire	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
8	where	where	ADV	WRB	PronType=Rel	11	advmod	_	_
9	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj:pass	_	_
10	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	left	leave	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	7	ccomp	_	_
12	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
15	whom	whom	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	18	obj	_	_
16	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj:pass	_	_
17	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
18	promised	promise	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	13	acl:relcl	_	_
19	to	to	PART	TO	_	20	mark	_	_
20	bring	bring	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	xcomp	_	_
21	back	back	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past | the sultan |  |  |  |  | politely *property* | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **inquire** *speech: other* | past | the sultan *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **leave** | past · perfect · passive |  | court |  |  |  |  | vn sustain-55.6-1 «NP V NP ADJ»: subject=Theme master=Attribute |
| 4 | **promise** *speech: promise* | past · perfect · passive |  | court |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **bring back** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3-1 «NP V NP together»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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.

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**Text:** «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 641 (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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