---
title: They died almost at the same time, leaving their kingdom to the elde… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: They died almost at the same time, leaving their kingdom to the eldest of their children, and commending their youngest son, Prince Narcissus, to the care of the Fairy Melinette. Who acts: parents, Fairy Melinette. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Narcissus and the Princes
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, Prince Narcissus and the Princess Potentilla, sentence 16

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They died almost at the same time, leaving their kingdom to the eldest of their children, and commending their youngest son, Prince Narcissus, to the care of the Fairy Melinette.

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**Who acts:** parents, Fairy Melinette · **What happens:** die, leave, commend, care · **To what, where:** kingdom, youngest son

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Narcissus and the Princess Potentilla. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (parents, Fairy Melinette), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg7277:11:16
# text = They died almost at the same time, leaving their kingdom to the eldest of their children, and commending their youngest son, Prince Narcissus, to the care of the Fairy Melinette.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	died	die	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	almost	almost	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
4	at	at	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
6	same	same	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
9	leaving	leave	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	advcl	_	_
10	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	kingdom	kingdom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	_
12	to	to	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	eldest	eld	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	9	xcomp	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	commending	commend	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	advcl	_	_
21	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	23	nmod:poss	_	_
22	youngest	young	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	23	amod	_	_
23	son	son	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
25	Prince	Prince	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	26	nmod:desc	_	_
26	Narcissus	Narcissus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	23	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	_
28	to	to	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
29	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
30	care	care	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
31	of	of	ADP	IN	_	34	case	_	_
32	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	34	det	_	_
33	Fairy	Fairy	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	34	compound	_	_
34	Melinette	Melinette	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	30	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **die** | past | parents *= parent* |  |  |  | time | almost *property* | vn calibratable\_cos-45.6.1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute |
| 2 | **leave** | gerund | parents *= parent* *not said here* | parents's kingdom |  |  |  | eld *property* | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent kingdom=Theme |
| 3 | **commend** | gerund | parents *= parent* *not said here* | parents's youngest son |  |  |  | to the care of the Fairy Melinette | vn judgment-33.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent son=Theme |
| 4 | **care** |  | the Fairy Melinette |  |  |  |  |  | nom care «act intransitive»: of=agent |

<!-- .note -->
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:** «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 7277 (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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