---
title: He was bowed down with years, his snowy beard descended to his girdl… — Legends of the conquest of Spain · tree and pragmatics
description: He was bowed down with years, his snowy beard descended to his girdle, and he supported his tottering steps with a palmer’s staff. Who acts: camp, tottering. A sentence of «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Chapter XIV., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clau
---

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# Legends of the conquest of Spain, Chapter XIV., sentence 12

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He was bowed down with years, his snowy beard descended to his girdle, and he supported his tottering steps with a palmer’s staff.

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**Who acts:** camp, tottering · **What happens:** bow down, descend, support, step · **To what, where:** camp, snowy beard, girdle

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This is a sentence of «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Chapter XIV.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (camp, tottering), 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:pg77685:15:12
# text = He was bowed down with years, his snowy beard descended to his girdle, and he supported his tottering steps with a palmer’s staff.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	aux:pass	_	_
3	bowed	bow	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
4	down	down	ADP	RP	_	3	compound:prt	_	_
5	with	with	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	years	year	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
8	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
9	snowy	snowy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	beard	beard	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	parataxis	_	_
11	descended	descend	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	10	acl	_	_
12	to	to	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	girdle	girdle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
17	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	supported	support	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
19	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	tottering	tottering	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nsubj	_	_
21	steps	step	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	ccomp	_	_
22	with	with	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	palmer	palmer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	’s	's	PART	POS	_	24	case	_	_
26	staff	staff	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **bow down** | past · passive |  | camp |  |  | year | camp's snowy beard *parataxis* | vn curtsey-40.3.3 «NP V NP»: subject=Topic |
| 2 | **descend** | participle |  | camp's snowy beard *not said here* |  | camp's girdle |  |  | vn meander-47.7-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme to girdle=Location |
| 3 | **support** | past | camp |  |  |  |  |  | vn admire-31.2 «NP V that S»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 4 | **step** | present | camp's tottering |  |  |  |  | with a palmer's staff | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V»: agent=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:** «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Project Gutenberg book 77685 (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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- ↑ back to [Chapter XIV.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg77685/15/)