---
title: They were, but yesterday, the occupants and owners of the fair fores… — Legends of the Northwest · tree and pragmatics
description: They were, but yesterday, the occupants and owners of the fair forests and fertile prairies of Minnesota--a brave, hospitable and generous people,--barbarians, indeed, but noble in their barbarism. Who acts: bands. A sentence of «Legends of the Northwest» by Hanford Lennox Gordon, The Sea-gull, the 
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8122/2/9/)

<!-- 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/) / [Legends of the Northwest](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8122/) / [The Sea-gull, the Ojibwa Legend of the…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8122/2/) / 9

# Legends of the Northwest, The Sea-gull, the Ojibwa Legend of the Pictured Rocks of Lake Superior., sentence 9

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They were, but yesterday, the occupants and owners of the fair forests and fertile prairies of Minnesota--a brave, hospitable and generous people,--barbarians, indeed, but noble in their barbarism.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** bands · **What happens:** be

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Legends of the Northwest» by Hanford Lennox Gordon, The Sea-gull, the Ojibwa Legend of the Pictured Rocks of Lake Superior.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (bands), 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:pg8122:2:10
# text = They were, but yesterday, the occupants and owners of the fair forests and fertile prairies of Minnesota--a brave, hospitable and generous people,--barbarians, indeed, but noble in their barbarism.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
4	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
5	yesterday	yesterday	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl:unmarked	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	occupants	occupant	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	appos	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	owners	owner	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	conj	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	fair	fair	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	forests	forest	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nmod	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
16	fertile	fertile	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	prairies	prairie	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	conj	_	_
18	of	of	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	Minnesota	Minnesota	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	17	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
22	brave	brave	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
24	hospitable	hospitable	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	conj	_	_
25	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
26	generous	generous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	conj	_	_
27	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	barbarians	barbarian	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	35	punct	_	_
32	indeed	indeed	ADV	RB	_	35	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	35	punct	_	_
34	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	35	cc	_	_
35	noble	noble	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	conj	_	_
36	in	in	ADP	IN	_	38	case	_	_
37	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	38	nmod:poss	_	_
38	barbarism	barbarism	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	35	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
39	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | bands *= band* |  |  |  | yesterday |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=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:** «Legends of the Northwest» by Hanford Lennox Gordon, Project Gutenberg book 8122 (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 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8122/2/8/)
- next →: [sentence 10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8122/2/10/)
- ↑ back to [The Sea-gull, the Ojibwa Legend of the Pictured Rocks of Lake Superior.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg8122/2/)