---
title: The hare said: “Don’t tie my tail so tight.” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: The hare said: “Don’t tie my tail so tight.” Who acts: hare. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Story of the Hare., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, Story of the Hare., sentence 61

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The hare said: “Don’t tie my tail so tight.”

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**Who acts:** hare · **What happens:** say, not tie · **To what, where:** tail · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Story of the Hare.. 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:pg71335:24:61
# text = The hare said: “Don’t tie my tail so tight.”
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	hare	hare	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	8	punct	_	_
5	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	Do	do	AUX	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	n’t	n't	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
8	tie	tie	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	ccomp	_	_
9	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
10	tail	tail	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
11	so	so	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
12	tight	tight	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the hare |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **not** **tie** *in a quote* | infinitive · do-support |  | my tail |  |  |  | tight *property* | vn mix-22.1-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent tail=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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