---
title: He was very fond of meat, although he was unable to kill anything hi… — Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria · tree and pragmatics
description: He was very fond of meat, although he was unable to kill anything himself. Who acts: hare. A sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Ii.--the Cunning Hare; Or, Why the Tortoise Has a Patched Shell., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Ii.--the Cunning Hare; Or, Why the Tortoise Has a Patched Shell., sentence 2

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He was very fond of meat, although he was unable to kill anything himself.

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**Who acts:** hare · **What happens:** be, kill · **To what, where:** anything

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This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Ii.--the Cunning Hare; Or, Why the Tortoise Has a Patched Shell.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (hare), 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:pg70959:4:2
# text = He was very fond of meat, although he was unable to kill anything himself.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
3	very	very	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	fond	fond	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
5	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	meat	meat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	although	although	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
9	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	cop	_	_
11	unable	unable	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	conj	_	_
12	to	to	PART	TO	_	13	mark	_	_
13	kill	kill	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	xcomp	_	_
14	anything	anything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	13	obj	_	_
15	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	14	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | hare |  |  |  |  | of meat; fond *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **is** | past | hare |  |  |  |  | unable *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **kill** | to-infinitive | hare *not said here* | anything  hare |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent anything=Theme |

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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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