---
title: They asked the manitous to help them. — Wigwam stories told by North American Indians · tree and pragmatics
description: They asked the manitous to help them. Who acts: hunters. A sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XXVI. the North Star, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Wigwam stories told by North American Indians, XXVI. the North Star, sentence 7

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They asked the manitous to help them.

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**Who acts:** hunters · **What happens:** ask, help · **To what, where:** hunters

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This is a sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XXVI. the North Star. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (hunters), 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:pg73136:51:7
# text = They asked the manitous to help them.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	manitous	manitous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	2	ccomp	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	advcl	_	_
7	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | hunters *= hunter* |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **help** | to-infinitive | hunters *= hunter* *not said here* | hunters *= hunter* |  |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=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:** «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, Project Gutenberg book 73136 (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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