---
title: His mother then heated some fat and poured on the tortoise. — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: His mother then heated some fat and poured on the tortoise. Who acts: mother. 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 431

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His mother then heated some fat and poured on the tortoise.

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**Who acts:** mother · **What happens:** heat, pour · **To what, where:** fat, tortoise

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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 (mother), 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:pg71335:10:431
# text = His mother then heated some fat and poured on the tortoise.
1	His	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	2	nmod:poss	_	_
2	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
4	heated	heat	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	some	some	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	6	det	_	_
6	fat	fat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	poured	pour	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	conj	_	_
9	on	on	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	tortoise	tortoise	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **heat** | past | Hlakanyana's mother | some fat |  |  | then |  | vn cooking-45.3 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent fat=Patient |
| 2 | **pour** | participle | Hlakanyana's mother *not said here* |  |  | the tortoise |  |  | vn substance\_emission-43.4-1 «NP V»: agent=Source |

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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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