---
title: I heard a great clattering coming, and what was there but a great gi… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: I heard a great clattering coming, and what was there but a great giant and two dozen of goats with him, and a buck at their head. Who acts: I, great clattering. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Conall Yellowclaw, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, Conall Yellowclaw, sentence 114

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I heard a great clattering coming, and what was there but a great giant and two dozen of goats with him, and a buck at their head.

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**Who acts:** I, great clattering · **What happens:** hear, come, be · **To what, where:** great clattering

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This is a sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Conall Yellowclaw. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, great clattering), 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:pg7885:9:114
# text = I heard a great clattering coming, and what was there but a great giant and two dozen of goats with him, and a buck at their head.
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
4	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
5	clattering	clattering	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	_
6	coming	come	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	5	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
9	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	11	nsubj	_	_
10	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	cop	_	_
11	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	2	parataxis	_	_
12	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
14	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	giant	giant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	conj	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
17	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	18	nummod	_	_
18	dozen	dozen	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	2	conj	_	_
19	of	of	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	goats	goat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	18	nmod	_	_
21	with	with	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
25	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	buck	buck	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	conj	_	_
27	at	at	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	29	nmod:poss	_	_
29	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **hear** | past | I | a great clattering |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer clattering=Stimulus |
| 2 | **come** | gerund | a great clattering *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **is** | past |  |  |  |  |  | there *property* | tree rules |

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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:** «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 7885 (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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