---
title: There was once a male goat who cut a large cotton-tree down and then… — Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria · tree and pragmatics
description: There was once a male goat who cut a large cotton-tree down and then burnt it. Who acts: male goat. A sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xxi.--why the Head of the Male Goat Smells So Strong., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Xxi.--why the Head of the Male Goat Smells So Strong., sentence 1

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There was once a male goat who cut a large cotton-tree down and then burnt it.

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**Who acts:** male goat · **What happens:** be, cut down, burnt · **To what, where:** large cotton tree, tree

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This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Xxi.--why the Head of the Male Goat Smells So Strong.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (male goat), 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:pg70959:15:1
# text = There was once a male goat who cut a large cotton-tree down and then burnt it.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	was	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	2	advmod	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
5	male	male	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
6	goat	goat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	_
7	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	8	nsubj	_	_
8	cut	cut	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	acl:relcl	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
10	large	large	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
11	cotton	cotton	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
14	down	down	ADP	RP	_	8	compound:prt	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
16	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	17	advmod	_	_
17	burnt	burnt	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
18	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | a male goat |  |  | there |  | once *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **cut down** | past | a male goat | a large cotton tree |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent tree=Product |
| 3 | **burnt** | past | a male goat *not said here* | tree |  |  | then |  | 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:** «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Project Gutenberg book 70959 (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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