---
title: Several of the stories purport to relate incidents in Gotama’s previ… — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: Several of the stories purport to relate incidents in Gotama’s previous states of existence as an animal. Who acts: Several stories. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 2, sentence 18

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Several of the stories purport to relate incidents in Gotama’s previous states of existence as an animal.

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**Who acts:** Several stories · **What happens:** purport, relate · **To what, where:** incidents, previous states

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Several stories), 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:pg74064:2:19
# text = Several of the stories purport to relate incidents in Gotama’s previous states of existence as an animal.
1	Several	several	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
2	of	of	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	stories	story	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nsubj	_	_
5	purport	purport	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	relate	relate	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	xcomp	_	_
8	incidents	incident	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obj	_	_
9	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
10	Gotama	Gotama	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	13	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	’s	's	PART	POS	_	10	case	_	_
12	previous	previous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	states	state	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obl	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	existence	existence	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nmod	_	_
16	as	as	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	animal	animal	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **purport** | present | the Several stories |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **relate** | to-infinitive | the Several stories *not said here* | incidents |  |  |  | in Gotama's previous states of existence *goal*; as a animal | vn involve-107.1 «NP V NP PP.goal»: agent=Agent incident=Theme in state=Goal |

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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 grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Project Gutenberg book 74064 (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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