---
title: This unfortunate youth had been taken captive by a savage people, wh… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: This unfortunate youth had been taken captive by a savage people, who had kept him to guard their sheep. Who acts: savage people. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Enchanted Ring, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Enchanted Ring, sentence 73

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This unfortunate youth had been taken captive by a savage people, who had kept him to guard their sheep.

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**Who acts:** savage people · **What happens:** take, keep, guard · **To what, where:** unfortunate youth, savage people, sheep

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Enchanted Ring. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (savage people), 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:pg7277:19:73
# text = This unfortunate youth had been taken captive by a savage people, who had kept him to guard their sheep.
1	This	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	3	det	_	_
2	unfortunate	unfortunate	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	youth	youth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj:pass	_	_
4	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
5	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	6	aux:pass	_	_
6	taken	take	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
7	captive	captive	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	xcomp	_	_
8	by	by	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	savage	savage	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
13	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	15	nsubj:pass	_	_
14	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
15	kept	keep	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	11	acl:relcl	_	_
16	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	_
17	to	to	PART	TO	_	18	mark	_	_
18	guard	guard	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	advcl	_	_
19	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	sheep	sheep	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	18	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **take** | past · perfect · passive | a savage people | this unfortunate youth |  |  |  | captive *property* | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent subject=Theme |
| 2 | **keep** | past · perfect · passive |  | a savage people |  |  |  |  | vn sustain-55.6-1 «NP V NP ADJ»: subject=Theme he=Attribute |
| 3 | **guard** | to-infinitive |  |  | people's sheep |  |  |  | vn defend-72.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent sheep=Beneficiary |

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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:** «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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