---
title: “Is it really the place we were digging yesterday?” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: “Is it really the place we were digging yesterday?” Who acts: doubt. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II., sentence 14

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“Is it really the place we were digging yesterday?”

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**Who acts:** doubt · **What happens:** be

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (doubt), 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:pg71335:4:14
# text = “Is it really the place we were digging yesterday?”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	9	cop	_	_
3	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
4	really	really	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	place	place	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nsubj	_	_
7	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
8	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	digging	dig	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
10	yesterday	yesterday	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl:unmarked	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** *in a quote* | present · progressive | doubt |  |  |  | yesterday | the place *nsubj*; we *nsubj*; dig *property* | 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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