---
title: "It was my father's sword," replied Theseus, with a tremulous voice. " — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: "It was my father's sword," replied Theseus, with a tremulous voice. " Who acts: sword. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Minotaur., part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Minotaur., part 2, sentence 55

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"It was my father's sword," replied Theseus, with a tremulous voice. "

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**Who acts:** sword · **What happens:** be, reply · **To what, where:** sword · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Minotaur., part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sword), 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:pg976:4:55
# text = "It was my father's sword," replied Theseus, with a tremulous voice. "
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
4	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	's	's	PART	POS	_	5	case	_	_
7	sword	sword	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	7	punct	_	_
10	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	Theseus	Theseus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	with	with	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	tremulous	tremulous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	voice	voice	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	16	punct	_	_
18	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | past | sword | my father's sword |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | my father's sword |  |  |  |  |  | vn respond-113 «NP V»: 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:** «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Project Gutenberg book 976 (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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