---
title: One does not become great by claiming greatness. — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: One does not become great by claiming greatness. Who acts: One. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Proverbs and Figurative Expressions., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, Proverbs and Figurative Expressions., sentence 134

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One does not become great by claiming greatness.

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**Who acts:** One · **What happens:** not become, claim · **To what, where:** greatness

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Proverbs and Figurative Expressions.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (One), 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:pg71335:26:134
# text = One does not become great by claiming greatness.
1	One	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	4	nsubj	_	_
2	does	do	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	4	advmod	_	_
4	become	become	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
5	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	xcomp	_	_
6	by	by	SCONJ	IN	_	7	mark	_	_
7	claiming	claim	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	5	advcl	_	_
8	greatness	greatness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **become** | present · do-support | One |  |  |  |  | great *property* | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |
| 2 | **claim** *speech: other* | gerund | One *not said here* | greatness |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent greatness=Topic |

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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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