---
title: Seleucus I Nicator, one of Alexander's generals, made Antioch the ca… — Damascus · tree and pragmatics
description: Seleucus I Nicator, one of Alexander's generals, made Antioch the capital of his empire, which led to the decline of Damascus's importance compared with new Seleucid cities such as Syrian Laodicea in the north. Who acts: Seleucus, empire, importance. A sentence of Wikipedia's «Damascus» with its dep
---

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# Damascus, sentence 116

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From Wikipedia, [«Damascus»](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damascus), revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). The trees and pragmatics of these pages, Mova's parse of that text, are CC BY-SA 4.0 too.

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Seleucus I Nicator, one of Alexander's generals, made Antioch the capital of his empire, which led to the decline of Damascus's importance compared with new Seleucid cities such as Syrian Laodicea in the north.

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**Who acts:** Seleucus, empire, importance · **What happens:** make, lead, compare, decline · **To what, where:** Antioch

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This is a sentence of the English Wikipedia article «Damascus». The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Seleucus, empire, importance), 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 article's note marks are left out of the parse.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = wikipedia:Damascus:116
# text = Seleucus I Nicator, one of Alexander's generals, made Antioch the capital of his empire, which led to the decline of Damascus's importance compared with new Seleucid cities such as Syrian Laodicea in the north.
1	Seleucus	Seleucus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	1	flat	_	_
3	Nicator	Nicator	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	1	flat	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
5	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	1	appos	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
7	Alexander	Alexander	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	's	's	PART	POS	_	7	case	_	_
9	generals	general	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
11	made	make	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	Antioch	Antioch	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	capital	capital	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	xcomp	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	empire	empire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	20	nsubj	_	_
20	led	lead	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	acl:relcl	_	_
21	to	to	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	decline	decline	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	obl	_	_
24	of	of	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
25	Damascus	Damascus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	27	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	's	's	PART	POS	_	25	case	_	_
27	importance	importance	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nmod	_	_
28	compared	compare	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	advcl	_	_
29	with	with	ADP	IN	_	32	case	_	_
30	new	new	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	32	amod	_	_
31	Seleucid	seleucid	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	32	compound	_	_
32	cities	city	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	28	obl	_	_
33	such	such	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|ExtPos=ADP	36	case	_	_
34	as	as	ADP	IN	_	33	fixed	_	_
35	Syrian	Syrian	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	36	amod	_	_
36	Laodicea	Laodicea	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	32	nmod	_	_
37	in	in	ADP	IN	_	39	case	_	_
38	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	39	det	_	_
39	north	north	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	36	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
40	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **make** | past | Seleucus | Antioch |  |  |  | the capital of Seleucus's empire *xcomp* | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent antioch=Product |
| 2 | **lead** | past | Seleucus's empire |  |  |  |  |  | vn result-27.2 «NP V PP»: agent=Precondition |
| 3 | **compare** | past | Seleucus's empire *not said here* |  |  |  |  | to the decline of Damascus's importance; with new Seleucid cities such Syrian Laodicea in the north | vn amalgamate-22.2-2 «NP V PP»: agent=Patient with city=Co-Patient |
| 4 | **decline** |  | Damascus's importance |  |  |  |  |  | nom decline «process intransitive»: of=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 English Wikipedia, «Damascus», revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, CC BY-SA 4.0. **Tree:** Mova's own parse, CC BY-SA 4.0 as the text is. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the article read in order, CC BY-SA 4.0.

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