---
title: It was under a tree of this species that Gotama sat on the night of… — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: It was under a tree of this species that Gotama sat on the night of his Enlightenment. Who acts: tree, species, Gotama. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 3, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 3, sentence 4

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It was under a tree of this species that Gotama sat on the night of his Enlightenment.

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**Who acts:** tree, species, Gotama · **What happens:** be, sit, enlighten · **To what, where:** tree

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (tree, species, Gotama), 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:pg74064:3:4
# text = It was under a tree of this species that Gotama sat on the night of his Enlightenment.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
3	under	under	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	8	det	_	_
8	species	species	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nmod	_	_
9	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	11	nsubj	_	_
10	Gotama	Gotama	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
11	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	acl:relcl	_	_
12	on	on	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	Enlightenment	enlightenment	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | tree |  |  | a tree |  | of this species | tree rules |
| 2 | **sit** | past | this species |  |  |  | night | Gotama *nsubj* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **enlighten** |  | Gotama |  |  |  |  |  | nom enlightenment «cognition transitive»: poss=agent |

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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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