---
title: Up to 1870 it was equally said of France and of Italy, that they pos… — English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Up to 1870 it was equally said of France and of Italy, that they possessed no folk-tales. Who acts: France. A sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, _to My Dear Little May_, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# English Fairy Tales, \_to My Dear Little May\_, sentence 6

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Up to 1870 it was equally said of France and of Italy, that they possessed no folk-tales.

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**Who acts:** France · **What happens:** say, possess · **To what, where:** quarter, 1870, folk tales · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, \_to My Dear Little May\_. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (France), 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:pg7439:3:6
# text = Up to 1870 it was equally said of France and of Italy, that they possessed no folk-tales.
1	Up	up	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
2	to	to	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
3	1870	1870	NUM	CD	NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card	7	obl	_	_
4	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
5	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	aux:pass	_	_
6	equally	equally	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	_
7	said	say	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	France	France	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	Italy	Italy	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
14	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
15	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	possessed	possess	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
17	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	20	det	_	_
18	folk	folk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	tales	tale	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past · passive |  | quarter | 1870 |  |  | of France and Italy; equally *property* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: subject=Topic to 1870=Recipient |
| 2 | **possess** | past | France | no folk tales |  |  |  |  | vn own-100.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot tale=Theme |

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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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