---
title: The old king shed tears, and besought Theseus not to leave him desol… — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The old king shed tears, and besought Theseus not to leave him desolate in his old age, more especially as he had but just begun to know the happiness of possessing a good and valiant son. Who acts: old shed tears, Theseus, happiness. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Mino
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg976/5/1/)

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Minotaur., part 3, sentence 1

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The old king shed tears, and besought Theseus not to leave him desolate in his old age, more especially as he had but just begun to know the happiness of possessing a good and valiant son.

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**Who acts:** old shed tears, Theseus, happiness · **What happens:** beseech, not leave, desolate, have, begin, know · **To what, where:** Theseus, old age, happiness, good son

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Minotaur., part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (old shed tears, Theseus, happiness), 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:pg976:5:1
# text = The old king shed tears, and besought Theseus not to leave him desolate in his old age, more especially as he had but just begun to know the happiness of possessing a good and valiant son.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
2	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
3	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	compound	_	_
4	shed	shed	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	compound	_	_
5	tears	tear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	besought	beseech	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	Theseus	Theseus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	_
10	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	12	advmod	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	leave	leave	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	advcl	_	_
13	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	obj	_	_
14	desolate	desolate	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	xcomp	_	_
15	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
16	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
17	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	age	age	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
20	more	more	ADV	RBR	Degree=Cmp	21	advmod	_	_
21	especially	especially	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
22	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	24	mark	_	_
23	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
24	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
25	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
26	just	just	ADV	RB	_	27	advmod	_	_
27	begun	begin	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	24	xcomp	_	_
28	to	to	PART	TO	_	29	mark	_	_
29	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	27	xcomp	_	_
30	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	31	det	_	_
31	happiness	happiness	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	obj	_	_
32	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	33	mark	_	_
33	possessing	possess	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	31	acl	_	_
34	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	38	det	_	_
35	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	38	amod	_	_
36	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	37	cc	_	_
37	valiant	valiant	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	35	conj	_	_
38	son	son	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	33	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
39	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **beseech** | past | the old shed tears | Theseus |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **not** **leave** | to-infinitive | the old shed tears *not said here* | Theseus |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **desolate** | infinitive | Theseus *not said here* |  |  |  | in Theseus's old age |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **have** | past | Theseus |  |  |  |  | especially *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **begin** | participle | Theseus *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 6 | **know** | to-infinitive | Theseus *not said here* | the happiness |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer happiness=Stimulus |
| 7 | **possess** | gerund | the happiness *not said here* | a good son |  |  |  |  | vn own-100.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot son=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.

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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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