---
title: They had told him that the three hundred and sixty literary men who… — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: They had told him that the three hundred and sixty literary men who had been at the feast had set upon and were beating Yen Kë Lao. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75089/20/77/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Gleanings from Chinese folklore](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75089/) / [A Story of Old China, part 4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75089/20/) / 77

# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, A Story of Old China, part 4, sentence 77

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They had told him that the three hundred and sixty literary men who had been at the feast had set upon and were beating Yen Kë Lao.

<!-- .vintro -->
**What happens:** tell, set, beat · **To what, where:** words, Emperor, hundred literary men, feast, Yen Kë · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg75089:20:77
# text = They had told him that the three hundred and sixty literary men who had been at the feast had set upon and were beating Yen Kë Lao.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj:pass	_	_
2	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	told	tell	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
4	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	iobj	_	_
5	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	20	mark	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	8	compound	_	_
8	hundred	hundred	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	12	nummod	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	sixty	sixty	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	8	conj	_	_
11	literary	literary	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	amod	_	_
12	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	nsubj	_	_
13	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	20	nsubj:pass	_	_
14	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	aux	_	_
15	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	20	aux:pass	_	_
16	at	at	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	feast	feast	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
19	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	aux	_	_
20	set	set	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	3	ccomp	_	_
21	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	20	obl	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
23	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
24	beating	beat	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	20	conj	_	_
25	Yen	Yen	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	26	compound	_	_
26	Kë	Kë	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	24	obj	_	_
27	Lao	Lao	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	26	flat	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past · perfect · passive |  | words *= word* | Emperor |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **set** | past · perfect · passive |  | hundred literary men |  | the feast |  | who *nsubj:pass* | vn put-9.1-2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: subject=Theme at feast=Destination |
| 3 | **beat** | past · progressive |  | Yen Kë |  |  |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location kë=Theme |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 76](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75089/20/76/)
- next →: [sentence 78](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75089/20/78/)
- ↑ back to [A Story of Old China, part 4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg75089/20/)