---
title: He had been the ruling chief since 1754. — Hawaiian Historical Legends · tree and pragmatics
description: He had been the ruling chief since 1754. Who acts: Captain. A sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, The Alapa Regiment, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Hawaiian Historical Legends, The Alapa Regiment, sentence 3

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He had been the ruling chief since 1754.

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**Who acts:** Captain · **What happens:** rule, be · **To what, where:** ruling chief

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This is a sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, The Alapa Regiment. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Captain), 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:pg66357:14:3
# text = He had been the ruling chief since 1754.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
3	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	6	cop	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	ruling	rule	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	6	amod	_	_
6	chief	chief	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
7	since	since	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	1754	1754	NUM	CD	NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card	6	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **rule** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn dub-29.3.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **is a** | past · perfect | Captain | the ruling chief |  |  | since 1754 |  | 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:** «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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