---
title: Who ever knew a king to take such counsel as to risk his knights on… — Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A Middle-Englis… · tree and pragmatics
description: Who ever knew a king to take such counsel as to risk his knights on a Christmas jest?” A sentence of «Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A Middle-English Arthurian Romance Retold in Modern Prose» by Jessie L. Weston, Opening, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A Middle-English Arthurian Romance Retold in Modern Prose, Opening, part 3, sentence 67

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Who ever knew a king to take such counsel as to risk his knights on a Christmas jest?”

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**What happens:** know, take, risk · **To what, where:** king, such counsel, knights, Christmas jest · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A Middle-English Arthurian Romance Retold in Modern Prose» by Jessie L. Weston, Opening, part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg66084:3:67
# text = Who ever knew a king to take such counsel as to risk his knights on a Christmas jest?”
1	Who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	3	nsubj	_	_
2	ever	ever	ADV	RB	PronType=Ind	3	advmod	_	_
3	knew	know	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	take	take	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	ccomp	_	_
8	such	such	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
9	counsel	counsel	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
10	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	risk	risk	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	advcl	_	_
13	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	knights	knight	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obj	_	_
15	on	on	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
17	Christmas	Christmas	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	18	compound	_	_
18	jest	jest	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **know** | past |  | a king |  |  | ever | Who *nsubj* | tree rules |
| 2 | **take** | to-infinitive |  | such counsel |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent counsel=Theme |
| 3 | **risk** | to-infinitive |  | Sir's knights |  | a Christmas jest |  |  | vn risk-94-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent knight=Pivot |

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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:** «Sir Gawain and the Green Knight: A Middle-English Arthurian Romance Retold in Modern Prose» by Jessie L. Weston, Project Gutenberg book 66084 (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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