---
title: The witch-sisters came laughing and taunting him, and said: — The man who married the moon, and other Pueblo I… · tree and pragmatics
description: The witch-sisters came laughing and taunting him, and said: Who acts: witch sisters. A sentence of «The man who married the moon, and other Pueblo Indian folk-stories» by Charles Fletcher Lummis, The Town of the Snake-girls, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The man who married the moon, and other Pueblo Indian folk-stories, The Town of the Snake-girls, sentence 31

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The witch-sisters came laughing and taunting him, and said:

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**Who acts:** witch sisters · **What happens:** come, laugh, taunt, say · **To what, where:** Man · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The man who married the moon, and other Pueblo Indian folk-stories» by Charles Fletcher Lummis, The Town of the Snake-girls. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (witch sisters), 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:pg77804:22:31
# text = The witch-sisters came laughing and taunting him, and said:
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
2	witch	witch	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	sisters	sister	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nsubj	_	_
5	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	laughing	laugh	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	5	advcl	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	taunting	taunt	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	6	conj	_	_
9	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **come** | past | the witch sisters |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **laugh** | gerund | the witch sisters *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn nonverbal\_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **taunt** | gerund | the witch sisters *not said here* | Man |  |  |  |  | vn bully-59.5 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Patient |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=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 man who married the moon, and other Pueblo Indian folk-stories» by Charles Fletcher Lummis, Project Gutenberg book 77804 (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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