---
title: And when in her turn the princess prepared to strike, the horse sank… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: And when in her turn the princess prepared to strike, the horse sank upon his knees, so that the blade pierced the genius’s thigh. Who acts: horse, blade. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Girl Who Pretended to Be a Boy, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of 
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Girl Who Pretended to Be a Boy, part 3, sentence 33

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
And when in her turn the princess prepared to strike, the horse sank upon his knees, so that the blade pierced the genius’s thigh.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** horse, blade · **What happens:** turn, prepare, strike, sink, pierce · **To what, where:** princess, thigh

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Girl Who Pretended to Be a Boy, 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 (horse, blade), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg641:40:33
# text = And when in her turn the princess prepared to strike, the horse sank upon his knees, so that the blade pierced the genius’s thigh.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	5	advmod	_	_
3	in	in	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
4	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	turn	turn	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	princess	princess	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
8	prepared	prepare	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	7	acl	_	_
9	to	to	PART	TO	_	10	mark	_	_
10	strike	strike	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	horse	horse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	_
14	sank	sink	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	acl:relcl	_	_
15	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	knees	knee	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
19	so	so	SCONJ	IN	ExtPos=SCONJ	23	mark	_	_
20	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	19	fixed	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	blade	blade	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nsubj	_	_
23	pierced	pierce	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	genius	genius	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	’s	's	PART	POS	_	25	case	_	_
27	thigh	thigh	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **turn** | imperative |  | the princess |  |  |  |  | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V ADJ.result»: agent=Theme princess=Result |
| 2 | **prepare** | participle |  | the princess *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn hire-13.5.3 «NP V NP to be NP»: agent=Agent clause=Attribute |
| 3 | **strike** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **sink** | past | the horse | the princess *not said here* |  |  |  | upon genius's knees | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent princess=Patient |
| 5 | **pierce** | past | the blade | the genius's thigh |  |  |  |  | vn poke-19-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent thigh=Patient |

<!-- .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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