---
title: And there on a sudden they came upon that old sage, and saw him stan… — The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth · tree and pragmatics
description: And there on a sudden they came upon that old sage, and saw him standing, plunged in meditation, motionless as a tree. Who acts: travellers, hand. A sentence of «The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth» by Unknown, An Evil Eye., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth, An Evil Eye., sentence 67

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And there on a sudden they came upon that old sage, and saw him standing, plunged in meditation, motionless as a tree.

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**Who acts:** travellers, hand · **What happens:** come, see, stand, plunge · **To what, where:** sudden, hand

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This is a sentence of «The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth» by Unknown, An Evil Eye.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (travellers, hand), 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:pg68641:2:67
# text = And there on a sudden they came upon that old sage, and saw him standing, plunged in meditation, motionless as a tree.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
2	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	7	expl	_	_
3	on	on	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	sudden	sudden	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	obl	_	_
6	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
9	that	that	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	11	det	_	_
10	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	sage	sage	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
15	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	_
16	standing	stand	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	14	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
18	plunged	plunge	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	16	conj	_	_
19	in	in	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	meditation	meditation	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
22	motionless	motionless	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
23	as	as	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **come** | past | travellers *= traveller* |  |  | a sudden; there |  | upon that old sage | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on sudden=Location |
| 2 | **see** | past | travellers *= traveller* *not said here* | hand |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **stand** | gerund | hand *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **plunge** | participle | hand *not said here* |  |  |  |  | in meditation | vn calibratable\_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.patient V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient in meditation=Attribute |

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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 descent of the sun: A cycle of birth» by Unknown, Project Gutenberg book 68641 (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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