---
title: But however much he asked, he found no answer: nor could anyone tell… — The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth · tree and pragmatics
description: But however much he asked, he found no answer: nor could anyone tell him anything about her. Who acts: sight, anyone. A sentence of «The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth» by Unknown, A Sleep and a Dream., part 6, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth, A Sleep and a Dream., part 6, sentence 26

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But however much he asked, he found no answer: nor could anyone tell him anything about her.

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**Who acts:** sight, anyone · **What happens:** ask, find, tell · **To what, where:** answer, anything, sight · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The descent of the sun: A cycle of birth» by Unknown, A Sleep and a Dream., part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sight, anyone), 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:pg68641:8:26
# text = But however much he asked, he found no answer: nor could anyone tell him anything about her.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
2	however	however	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
3	much	much	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
7	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	found	find	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	10	det	_	_
10	answer	answer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	15	punct	_	_
12	nor	nor	CCONJ	CC	Polarity=Neg	15	cc	_	_
13	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
14	anyone	anyone	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	15	nsubj	_	_
15	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	conj	_	_
16	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	iobj	_	_
17	anything	anything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	15	obj	_	_
18	about	about	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | sight |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **find** | past | sight | no answer |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent answer=Topic |
| 3 | **tell** *speech: assert* | could | anyone | anything | sight |  |  | about Shrí | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent he=Recipient anything=Topic |

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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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