---
title: Then their father shook them, and said they must go while their moth… — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: Then their father shook them, and said they must go while their mother was sleeping. Who acts: father, man, mother. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of the Cannibal Mother and Her Children., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of the Cannibal Mother and Her Children., sentence 36

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Then their father shook them, and said they must go while their mother was sleeping.

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**Who acts:** father, man, mother · **What happens:** shake, say, go, sleep · **To what, where:** man · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of the Cannibal Mother and Her Children.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (father, man, 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:pg71335:15:36
# text = Then their father shook them, and said they must go while their mother was sleeping.
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
2	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	shook	shake	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
9	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	must	must	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	ccomp	_	_
12	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
13	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nsubj	_	_
15	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	sleeping	sleep	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **shake** | past | man's father | man |  |  | then |  | vn shake-22.3-2 «NP V NP together»: agent=Agent they=Patient |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | man's father *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **go** | must | man |  |  |  |  |  | vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **sleep** | past · progressive | man's mother |  |  |  |  |  | vn snooze-40.4-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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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