---
title: Did any one ever see people eating their mother before?” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: Did any one ever see people eating their mother before?” Who acts: one, people. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Hlakanyana., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of Hlakanyana., sentence 176

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Did any one ever see people eating their mother before?”

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**Who acts:** one, people · **What happens:** see, eat · **To what, where:** people, mother

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Hlakanyana.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (one, people), 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:pg71335:10:176
# text = Did any one ever see people eating their mother before?”
1	Did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
2	any	any	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	3	det	_	_
3	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	ever	ever	ADV	RB	PronType=Ind	5	advmod	_	_
5	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obj	_	_
7	eating	eat	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	6	acl	_	_
8	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
10	before	before	SCONJ	IN	_	7	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | past · do-support | any one | people |  |  | ever |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer people=Stimulus |
| 2 | **eat** | gerund | people *not said here* | people's mother |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mother=Patient |

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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:** «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Project Gutenberg book 71335 (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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