---
title: The boy said: “We have no father and no mother; rock, be our house.” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: The boy said: “We have no father and no mother; rock, be our house.” Who acts: boy, We. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Story of the Bird That Made Milk. I., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, Story of the Bird That Made Milk. I., sentence 126

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The boy said: “We have no father and no mother; rock, be our house.”

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**Who acts:** boy, We · **What happens:** say, have, be · **To what, where:** father, house · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Story of the Bird That Made Milk. I.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (boy, We), 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:pg71335:3:126
# text = The boy said: “We have no father and no mother; rock, be our house.”
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	boy	boy	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	:	_	7	punct	_	_
5	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	We	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	have	have	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	ccomp	_	_
8	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	9	det	_	_
9	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
11	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	12	det	_	_
12	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	14	punct	_	_
14	rock	rock	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
16	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	cop	_	_
17	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	14	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 boy |  |  |  |  | rock and our house *ccomp* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **have** *in a quote* | present | We | no father and no mother |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent father=Patient |
| 3 | **is a** *in a quote* | infinitive | the boy *not said here* | our house |  |  |  | our *nmod:poss* | 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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