---
title: When history is told by genealogies, rather than by cycles of years,… — Hawaiian Historical Legends · tree and pragmatics
description: When history is told by genealogies, rather than by cycles of years, the time-problem is difficult to solve. Who acts: time problem. A sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Laa From Tahiti, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Hawaiian Historical Legends, Laa From Tahiti, sentence 1

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When history is told by genealogies, rather than by cycles of years, the time-problem is difficult to solve.

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**Who acts:** time problem · **What happens:** tell, be, solve · **To what, where:** history, genealogies · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Laa From Tahiti. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (time problem), 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:pg66357:10:1
# text = When history is told by genealogies, rather than by cycles of years, the time-problem is difficult to solve.
1	When	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	4	mark	_	_
2	history	history	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj:pass	_	_
3	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux:pass	_	_
4	told	tell	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
5	by	by	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	genealogies	genealogy	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	iobj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	rather	rather	ADV	RB	ExtPos=CCONJ	11	cc	_	_
9	than	than	ADP	IN	_	8	fixed	_	_
10	by	by	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
11	cycles	cycle	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	conj	_	_
12	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	years	year	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
16	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	problem	problem	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nsubj	_	_
19	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	20	cop	_	_
20	difficult	difficult	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	conj	_	_
21	to	to	PART	TO	_	22	mark	_	_
22	solve	solve	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	20	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | present · passive |  | history | genealogies rather cycles of years |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: subject=Recipient genealogy=Topic |
| 2 | **is** | present | the time problem |  |  |  |  | difficult *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **solve** | to-infinitive | the time problem *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent |

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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:** «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Project Gutenberg book 66357 (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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