---
title: However, they might have spared themselves the trouble, as he knew i… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: However, they might have spared themselves the trouble, as he knew it was only idle talk. Who acts: youth, family. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Maiden With the Wooden Helmet, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Maiden With the Wooden Helmet, sentence 32

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However, they might have spared themselves the trouble, as he knew it was only idle talk.

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**Who acts:** youth, family · **What happens:** spare, know, be · **To what, where:** mother, idle talk · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Maiden With the Wooden Helmet. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (youth, family), 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:pg641:31:32
# text = However, they might have spared themselves the trouble, as he knew it was only idle talk.
1	However	however	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj:pass	_	_
4	might	might	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
5	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	aux	_	_
6	spared	spare	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
7	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	6	obj	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	trouble	trouble	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
11	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	13	mark	_	_
12	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	knew	know	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
14	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
15	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	cop	_	_
16	only	only	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
17	idle	idle	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	talk	talk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **spare** | might · perfect · passive |  | mother |  |  |  | however *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **know** | past | youth |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 3 | **is a** | past | family | idle talk |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

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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 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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