---
title: When they began to eat the meat, that was so tasteless they couldn't… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: When they began to eat the meat, that was so tasteless they couldn't eat it. Who acts: twas, that. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Cap O' Rushes, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# English Fairy Tales, Cap O' Rushes, sentence 90

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When they began to eat the meat, that was so tasteless they couldn't eat it.

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**Who acts:** twas, that · **What happens:** begin, eat, be, not eat · **To what, where:** meat

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This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Cap O' Rushes. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (twas, that), 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:pg7439:15:90
# text = When they began to eat the meat, that was so tasteless they couldn't eat it.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	3	advmod	_	_
2	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	to	to	PART	TO	_	5	mark	_	_
5	eat	eat	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	meat	meat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
9	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	12	nsubj	_	_
10	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	cop	_	_
11	so	so	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
12	tasteless	tasteless	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	parataxis	_	_
13	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
14	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	n't	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	16	advmod	_	_
16	eat	eat	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	ccomp	_	_
17	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **begin** | past | twas *= twa* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **eat** | to-infinitive | twas *= twa* *not said here* | the meat |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent meat=Patient |
| 3 | **is** | past | that |  |  |  |  | tasteless *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **not** **eat** | could | twas *= twa* | meat |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Patient |

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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:** «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 7439 (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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