--- title: In 1798, the British sea captain John Fearn, on his trading ship Hun… — Nauru · tree and pragmatics description: In 1798, the British sea captain John Fearn, on his trading ship Hunter (300 tons), became the first Westerner to report sighting Nauru, calling it "Pleasant Island" because of its attractive appearance. Who acts: British sea captain. A sentence of Wikipedia's «Nauru» with its dependency tree and pr --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/Nauru/32/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [wikipedia](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/) / [en](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/) / [Nauru](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/Nauru/) / 32 # Nauru, sentence 32 From Wikipedia, [«Nauru»](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nauru), 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. In 1798, the British sea captain John Fearn, on his trading ship Hunter (300 tons), became the first Westerner to report sighting Nauru, calling it "Pleasant Island" because of its attractive appearance. **Who acts:** British sea captain · **What happens:** become, report, sight, call · **To what, where:** first Westerner, 1798, Nauru, Westerner · **Speech:** someone speaks here This is a sentence of the English Wikipedia article «Nauru». The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (British sea captain), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. **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:Nauru:32 # text = In 1798, the British sea captain John Fearn, on his trading ship Hunter (300 tons), became the first Westerner to report sighting Nauru, calling it "Pleasant Island" because of its attractive appearance. 1 In in ADP IN _ 2 case _ _ 2 1798 1798 NUM CD NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card 21 obl _ SpaceAfter=No 3 , , PUNCT , _ 2 punct _ _ 4 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 7 det _ _ 5 British British ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 7 amod _ _ 6 sea sea NOUN NN Number=Sing 7 compound _ _ 7 captain captain NOUN NN Number=Sing 21 nsubj _ _ 8 John John PROPN NNP Number=Sing 7 appos _ _ 9 Fearn Fearn PROPN NNP Number=Sing 8 flat _ SpaceAfter=No 10 , , PUNCT , _ 14 punct _ _ 11 on on ADP IN _ 14 case _ _ 12 his his PRON PRP$ Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs 14 nmod:poss _ _ 13 trading trading NOUN NN Number=Sing 14 compound _ _ 14 ship ship NOUN NN Number=Sing 7 conj _ _ 15 Hunter Hunter PROPN NNP Number=Sing 14 appos _ _ 16 ( ( PUNCT -LRB- _ 18 punct _ SpaceAfter=No 17 300 300 NUM CD NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card 18 nummod _ _ 18 tons ton NOUN NNS Number=Plur 7 appos _ SpaceAfter=No 19 ) ) PUNCT -RRB- _ 18 punct _ SpaceAfter=No 20 , , PUNCT , _ 7 punct _ _ 21 became become VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 22 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 24 det _ _ 23 first first ADJ JJ Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord 24 amod _ _ 24 Westerner westerner NOUN NN Number=Sing 21 xcomp _ _ 25 to to PART TO _ 26 mark _ _ 26 report report VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 24 acl _ _ 27 sighting sight VERB VBG VerbForm=Ger 26 xcomp _ _ 28 Nauru Nauru PROPN NNP Number=Sing 27 obj _ SpaceAfter=No 29 , , PUNCT , _ 30 punct _ _ 30 calling call VERB VBG Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part 21 advcl _ _ 31 it it PRON PRP Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 30 obj _ _ 32 " " PUNCT `` _ 34 punct _ SpaceAfter=No 33 Pleasant pleasant ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 34 amod _ _ 34 Island Island PROPN NNP Number=Sing 30 xcomp _ SpaceAfter=No 35 " " PUNCT '' _ 34 punct _ _ 36 because because ADP IN ExtPos=ADP 40 case _ _ 37 of of ADP IN _ 36 fixed _ _ 38 its its PRON PRP$ Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs 40 nmod:poss _ _ 39 attractive attractive ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 40 amod _ _ 40 appearance appearance NOUN NN Number=Sing 30 obl _ SpaceAfter=No 41 . . PUNCT . _ 21 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **become** | past | the British sea captain and John's trading ship | the first Westerner | | | | in 1798 *result* | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient in 1798=Result | | 2 | **report** | to-infinitive | the British sea captain and John's trading ship *not said here* | the first Westerner *not said here* | | | | | vn characterize-29.2-1-2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent clause=Theme | | 3 | **sight** | gerund | the British sea captain and John's trading ship *not said here* | Nauru | | | | | vn sight-30.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer nauru=Stimulus | | 4 | **call** | gerund | the British sea captain and John's trading ship *not said here* | Westerner | | | | because Westerner's attractive appearance; Pleasant Island *xcomp* | vn initiate\_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent it=Recipient | 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. **Text:** the English Wikipedia, «Nauru», 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. - ← previous: [sentence 31](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/Nauru/31/) - next →: [sentence 33](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/Nauru/33/) - ↑ back to [Nauru](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/Nauru/)