---
title: Yet while they were burning the empress seemed to hear the same word… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Yet while they were burning the empress seemed to hear the same words, which she alone could understand. Who acts: beds, heap. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Boys With the Golden Stars, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Boys With the Golden Stars, sentence 67

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Yet while they were burning the empress seemed to hear the same words, which she alone could understand.

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**Who acts:** beds, heap · **What happens:** burn, seem, hear, understand · **To what, where:** empress, same words

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Boys With the Golden Stars. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (beds, heap), 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:pg641:35:67
# text = Yet while they were burning the empress seemed to hear the same words, which she alone could understand.
1	Yet	yet	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
2	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
3	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
4	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
5	burning	burn	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	empress	empress	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
8	seemed	seem	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	to	to	PART	TO	_	10	mark	_	_
10	hear	hear	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	xcomp	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	same	same	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	words	word	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
15	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	19	obj	_	_
16	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
17	alone	alone	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
18	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
19	understand	understand	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **burn** | past · progressive | beds *= bed* | the empress |  |  |  |  | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent empress=Theme |
| 2 | **seem** | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Theme clause=Attribute |
| 3 | **hear** | to-infinitive |  | the same words |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer word=Stimulus |
| 4 | **understand** | could | heap | the same words |  |  |  | alone *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer which=Stimulus |

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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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