---
title: The tortoise replied: “No, I am not tired.” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: The tortoise replied: “No, I am not tired.” Who acts: tortoise. 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 425

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The tortoise replied: “No, I am not tired.”

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**Who acts:** tortoise · **What happens:** reply, not be · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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 (tortoise), 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:pg71335:10:425
# text = The tortoise replied: “No, I am not tired.”
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	tortoise	tortoise	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	3	punct	_	_
5	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	No	no	INTJ	UH	Polarity=Neg	11	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
8	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
9	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	cop	_	_
10	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	11	advmod	_	_
11	tired	tired	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | the tortoise |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V S-Quote»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **not** **is** *in a quote* | present | the tortoise *= tortoise* |  |  |  |  | tired *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:** «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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