---
title: But his wife was childless. — Indian tales of the great ones among men, women,… · tree and pragmatics
description: But his wife was childless. Who acts: wife. A sentence of «Indian tales of the great ones among men, women, and bird-people» by Cornelia Sorabji, Opening, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Indian tales of the great ones among men, women, and bird-people, Opening, part 2, sentence 70

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But his wife was childless.

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**Who acts:** wife · **What happens:** be

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This is a sentence of «Indian tales of the great ones among men, women, and bird-people» by Cornelia Sorabji, Opening, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wife), 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:pg69647:2:70
# text = But his wife was childless.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
5	childless	childless	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | Drupada's wife |  |  |  |  | childless *property* | 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:** «Indian tales of the great ones among men, women, and bird-people» by Cornelia Sorabji, Project Gutenberg book 69647 (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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