Universal Dependencies

acl stands for finite and non-finite clauses that modify a nominal. The acl relation contrasts with the advcl relation, which is used for adverbial clauses that modify a predicate. The head of the acl relation is the noun that is modified, and the dependent is the head of the clause that modifies the noun.

the issues as he sees them
acl(issues, sees)

Cette affaire à suivre \n This case to follow 
acl(affaire, suivre)

This relation is also used for optional depictives. The adjective is taken to modify the nominal of which it provides a secondary predication. See xcomp for further discussion of resultatives and depictives.

She entered the room sad
acl(She, sad)

He painted the model naked
acl(model, naked)

A relative clause is an instance of acl, characterized by finiteness and usually omission of the modified noun in the embedded clause. Some languages use a language-particular subtype for the traditional class of relative clauses.

I saw the man you love
acl(man, love)

Some languages allow finite clausal complements for nouns with a subset of nouns like fact or report. These look roughly like relative clauses, but do not have any omitted role in the dependent clause. This is the class of “content clauses” in Huddleston and Pullum 2002). These are also analyzed as acl.

the fact that nobody cares
acl(fact, cares)

An adverbial clause modifier is a clause which modifies a verb or other predicate (adjective, etc.), as a modifier not as a core complement. This includes things such as a temporal clause, consequence, conditional clause, purpose clause, etc. The dependent must be clausal (or else it is an advmod) and the dependent is the main predicate of the clause.

The accident happened as night was falling
advcl(happened, falling)

If you know who did it, you should tell the teacher
advcl(tell, know)

He talked to him in order to secure the account
advcl(talked, secure)

He was upset when I talked to him
advcl(upset, talked)

An adverbial modifier of a word is a (non-clausal) adverb or adverbial phrase that serves to modify the meaning of the word.

Note that in some grammatical traditions, the term adverbial modifier covers constituents that function like adverbs regardless whether they are realized by adverbs, adpositional phrases, or nouns in particular morphological cases. We differentiate adverbials realized as adverbs (advmod) and adverbials realized by noun phrases or adpositional phrases (nmod).

Genetically modified food
advmod(modified, Genetically)

less often
advmod(often, less)

Where/ADV do/AUX you/PRON want/VERB to/ADP go/VERB later/ADV ?/PUNCT
advmod(go, Where)
advmod(go, later)

About 200 people came to the party
advmod(200, About)

Sam , my brother , arrived
appos(Sam-1, brother-4)

Bill ( John 's cousin )
appos(Bill-1, cousin-5)

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation ( ABC )
appos(Corporation-4, ABC-6)

Sam , my brother , John 's cousin , arrived
appos(Sam-1, brother-4)
appos(Sam-1, cousin-8)

You can choose between four subjects : language ( German or French ) , economy , technology and art .
appos(subjects, language)
conj(language, economy)
conj(language, technology)
conj(language, art)
cc(language, and)
appos(language, German)
conj(German, French)
cc(German, or)

appos is also used to link key-value pairs in addresses, signatures, etc. (see also the list label):

Steve Jones Phone: 555-9814 Email: jones@abc.edf
name(Steve-1, Jones-2)
list(Steve-1, Phone:-3)
list(Steve-1, Email:-5)
appos(Phone:-3, 555-9814-4)
appos(Email:-5, jones@abc.edf-6)

An auxiliary of a clause is a non-main verb of the clause, e.g., a modal auxiliary, or a form of be, do or have in a periphrastic tense.

Exception: Auxiliary verb used to construct the passive voice is not labeled aux but auxpass.

Reagan has died
aux(died-3, has-2)

He should leave
aux(leave-3, should-2)

Do you think that he will have left when we come ?
aux(think, Do)
aux(left, will)
aux(left, have)

the Chair 's office
det(Chair-2, the-1)
nmod(office-4, Chair-2)
case(Chair-2, 's-3)

the office of the Chair
det(office-2, the-1)
nmod(office-2, Chair-5)
case(Chair-5, of-3)
det(Chair-5, the-4)

le bureau du président \n the office of the_Chair
det(bureau, le)
nmod(bureau, président)
case(président, du)

hwa/PRON rah/VERB at/PART[Case=Acc] h/DET klb/NOUN \n he saw ACC the dog  
dobj(rah-2, klb-5)
case(klb-5, at-3)

When case markers are morphemes, they are not divided off the noun as a separate case dependent, but the noun as a whole is analyzed as a nmod of the verb. To overtly mark case, POS tags and features are included in the representation as shown below on a Russian example (put your mouse pointer over the words to see additional morphosyntactic features).

# I wrote the letter with a quill.
1   Я         ja         PRON   _   Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs        2   nsubj   _   I
2   написал   napisat'   VERB   _   Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Act   0   root    _   wrote
3   письмо    pis'mo     NOUN   _   Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing                  2   dobj    _   the-letter
4   пером     pero       NOUN   _   Case=Ins|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing                  2   nmod    _   with-a-quill

This treatment provides parallelism between different constructions across and within languages. A good result is that we now have greater parallelism between prepositional phrases and subordinate clauses, which are often introduced by a preposition in some languages:

Sue left after the rehearsal
nsubj(left-2, Sue-1)
nmod(left-2, rehearsal-5)
det(rehearsal-5, the-4)
case(rehearsal-5, after-3)

Sue left after we did
nsubj(left-2, Sue-1)
advcl(left-2, did-5)
mark(did-5, after-3)
nsubj(did-5, we-4)

We also obtain parallel constructions for

• the possessive alternation

the Chair 's office
det(Chair-2, the-1)
nmod(office-4, Chair-2)
case(Chair-2, 's-3)

the office of the Chair
det(office-2, the-1)
nmod(office-2, Chair-5)
case(Chair-5, of-3)
det(Chair-5, the-4)

• variant forms with case, a preposition or a postposition in Finnish

etsiä ilman johtolankaa \n to_search without clue.PARTITIVE
nmod(etsiä, johtolankaa)
case(johtolankaa, ilman)

etsiä taskulampun kanssa \n to_search torch.GENITIVE with
nmod(etsiä, taskulampun)
case(taskulampun, kanssa)

etsiä johtolangatta \n to_search clue.ABESSIVE
nmod(etsiä, johtolangatta)

• the dative alternation where the prepositional construction gets a similar analysis to the double object construction

give the children the toys
dobj(give, toys)
iobj(give, children)

give the toys to the children
dobj(give, toys)
nmod(give, children)
case(children, to)

# give the toys to the children
1     donner    donner   VERB   _   VerbForm=Inf               0   root   _   give
2     les       le       DET    _   Definite=Def|Number=Plur   3   det    _   the
3     jouets    jouet    NOUN   _   Gender=Masc|Number=Plur    1   dobj   _   toys
4-5   aux       _        _      _   _                          _   _      _   _
4     à         à        ADP    _   _                          6   case   _   to
5     les       le       DET    _   Definite=Def|Number=Plur   6   det    _   the
6     enfants   enfant   NOUN   _   Gender=Masc|Number=Plur    1   nmod   _   children

Another advantage of this new analysis is that it provides a treatment of prepositional phrases that are predicative complements of “be” that is consistent with the treatment of nominal predicative complements:

Sue is in shape
nsubj(shape-4, Sue-1)
cop(shape-4, is-2)
case(shape-4, in-3)

When prepositions are stacked (that is, there is a sequence of prepositions), there are two possible analyses. If the sequence is a frozen combination with a specific meaning, then the best analysis is as an mwe. An English example of this is out of:

Out of all this , something good will come .
case(this-4, Out-1)
mwe(Out-1, of-2)
det(this-4, all-3)
nmod(come, this-4)

However, if various combinations of prepositions can be used to express different meaning combinations or nuances, then each preposition is independently analyzed as a case dependent. Examples of this in English include up beside (which can alternate with down beside or up near) or except during which can alternate with as during or except after:

The cafe up beside the lookout
det(cafe-2, The-1)
case(lookout-6, up-3)
case(lookout-6, beside-4)
det(lookout-6, the-5)
nmod(cafe-2, lookout-6)

For more on coordination, see the conj relation. A cc is the relation between the first conjunct and the coordinating conjunction delimiting another conjunct. (Note: different dependency grammars have different treatments of coordination. We take the first conjunct as the head of the coordination.)

Bill is big and honest
cc(big, and)

A coordinating conjunction may also appear at the beginning of a sentence. This is also called a cc, and it depends on the root predicate of the sentence. (In fact there is a coordination that spans multiple sentences. We cannot attach a word to the first conjunct because it is in another sentence. Thus we attach it to the first conjunct available in the current sentence: its main predicate.)

And then we left .
cc(left, And)

He says that you like to swim
ccomp(says, like)
mark(like, that)

He says you like to swim
ccomp(says, like)

Such clausal complements may be finite or nonfinite. However, if the subject of the clausal complement is controlled (that is, must be the same as the higher subject or object, with no other possible interpretation) the appropriate relation is xcomp.

The boss said to start digging
ccomp(said, start)
mark(start, to)

We started digging
xcomp(started, digging)

The key difference here is that, while it is possible to interpret the first sentence to mean that the boss will not be doing any digging, in the second sentence it is clear that the subject of digging can only be we. This is what distinguishes ccomp and xcomp.

Additionally, ccomp is used with copulas.

The important thing is to keep calm.
ccomp(is, keep)

The problem is that this has never been tried .
ccomp(is, tried)

(In these cases, the copula is treated as a head. This is a somewhat inconsistent and ugly feature of the current UD. An alternative solution was adopted for this case in the Turku TDT. It may be worth considering adopting it in a revision of UD.)

Note: In earlier versions of SD/USD, complement clauses with nouns like fact or report were also analyzed as ccomp. However, we now analyze them as acl. Hence, ccomp does not appear in nominals. This makes sense, since nominals normally do not take core arguments.

Phone book
compound(book, Phone)

I have four thousand sheep
compound(thousand, four)

I lost $ 3.2 billion
compound(billion, 3.2)

put up
compound(put, up)

• mwe for fixed grammaticized expressions with function words
• name for proper nouns constituted of multiple nominal elements

The relation determiner (det) holds between a nominal head and its determiner. Most commonly, a word of POS DET will have the relation det and vice versa. The known exceptions at present are:

• In some of the datasets, a possessive determiner like [en] my is currently given the POS tag DET but the relation nmod, so that it is parallel with other possessive constructions. This is not yet completely parallel across languages; in some languages, it is much more clear than in English how possessive determiners relate to adjectives, and the nmod relation is out of question.

The man is here
det(man, The)

Which book do you prefer ?
det(book, Which)

This is used for interjections and other discourse particles and elements (which are not clearly linked to the structure of the sentence, except in an expressive way). We generally follow the guidelines of what the Penn Treebanks count as an INTJ. They define this to include: interjections (oh, uh-huh, Welcome), fillers (um, ah), and discourse markers (well, like, actually, but not you know).

Iguazu is in Argentina :)
discourse(is-2, :)-5)

象 は 鼻 が 長い \n zoo wa hana ga naga-i \n elephant TOPIC nose SUBJ long-PRES
dislocated(長い-5, 象-1)

to jani ton kserume poli kala \n the John-Acc him know-1pl very well 
dislocated(kserume, jani)

However, it would not be used for a topic-marked noun that is also the subject of the sentence; this would be an nsubj.

It is also used for postposed elements. The dislocated elements attach to the same governor as the dependent that they double for. Right dislocated elements are frequent in spoken languages. French and Greek examples follow.

Il faut pas la manger , la plasticine \n It must not it eat , the playdough
dobj(manger, la-4)
dislocated(manger, plasticine)
dobj(eat, it-13)
dislocated(eat, playdough)

ton kserume oli mas edho poli kala, to jani 
dislocated(kserume, jani)

She gave me a raise
dobj(gave, raise)

In languages distinguishing morphological cases, the direct object will often be marked by the accusative case. However, verb valency may occasionally dictate a different form, such as the dative case in the following German example:

jemandem begegnen \n someone.Dat to-meet
dobj(begegnen, jemandem)

In general, if there is just one object, it should be labeled dobj, regardless of the morphological case or semantic role that it bears. If there are two or more objects, one of them should be dobj and the others should be iobj. In such cases it is necessary to decide what is the most directly affected object (patient). The one exception is when there is a clausal complement. Then the clausal complement is regarded as a “clausal direct object” and an object nominal will be an iobj. There is more discussion of constructions with multiple objects on the page for iobj. If possible, language-specific documentation should be available to help identify direct objects.

There is a ghost in the room
expl(is, There)

It is clear that we should decline .
expl(clear, It)

There is a ghost in the room
expl(is, There)
nsubj(is, ghost)
nmod(is, room)

I believe there to be a ghost in the room
nsubj(believe, I)
expl(believe, there)
xcomp(believe, be)
nsubj(be, ghost)
nmod(be, room)

It is clear that we should decline .
expl(clear, It)
csubj(clear, decline)

That we should decline is clear .
csubj(clear, decline)

I mentioned it to Mary that Sue is leaving
nsubj(mentioned, I)
expl(mentioned, it)
nmod(mentioned, Mary)
ccomp(mentioned, leaving)

A second, related, use of the expl relation is for cases of true clitic doubling. For languages in which clitics and lexical nominals are ususally in complementary distribution – languages, such as French, which obey “Kayne’s generalization” – then whichever of a clitic or a lexical nominal occurs will get the appropriate role, such as dobj or iobj. In such languages, when doubling does occur, such as in spoken French, the right analysis is to regard the lexical nominal as dislocated (see the examples there). However, other languages, such as Greek and Bulgarian, standardly allow doubling of a lexical nominal and a pronominal clitic, with the former still appearing in its regular role as an argument of the predicate. In these cases, if only one of the lexical nominal and the clitic appear in a clause, then whichever appears will be given the grammatical role of dobj, iobj, etc. – parallel to the treatment of lexical nominals and pronouns in other languages, modulo the clitic pronoun having a different position in the sentence. However, if both occur, the lexical nominal will be given the grammatical role of dobj, iobj, etc., and the clitic will be treated as a pronominal copy, which does not receive its own semantic role, and hence will get the role expl. Modulo the different word order, this is fairly parallel to the treatment of it and there in English mentioned above, where another phrase satisfies the semantic role of the predicate. Examples from Greek and Bulgarian follow:

Της τον έδωσε της Καίτης τον αναπτήρα \n PRON.Fem.Gen PRON.Masc.Acc gave ART.Fem.Gen Keti.Gen ART.Masc.Acc lighter.Acc
expl(έδωσε, Της-1)
iobj(έδωσε, Καίτης)
det(Καίτης, της-4)
expl(έδωσε, τον-2)
dobj(έδωσε, αναπτήρα)
det(αναπτήρα, τον-6)

Marija mu izprati pismo na rabotnika \n Maria 3.S.M.IO sent letter to the.worker
expl(izprati, mu)
dobj(izprati, pismo)
iobj(izprati, rabotnika)
case(rabotnika, na)

The expletive relation is also used for reflexive pronouns (see the feature u-feat/Reflex) attached to inherently reflexive verbs, i.e. verbs that cannot occur without the reflexive pronoun and thus the pronoun does not play the role of a normal object (otherwise it would be possible to substitute it with an irreflexive pronoun or other nominal). A Czech example:

Martin se bojí zvířat . \n Martin REFLEX fears animals .
expl(bojí, se)
expl(fears, REFLEX)

Further general discussion of expletives can be found in Postal, P. M., and G. K. Pullum (1988) “Expletive Noun Phrases in Subcategorized Positions,” Linguistic Inquiry 19(4): 635–670. The status of clitic doubling, and arguments for the lexical nominal being an argument with the clitic a kind of pronominal copy, appear inter alia in Boris Harizanov (2014) Clitic doubling at the syntax-morphology interface: A-movement and morphological merger in Bulgarian. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory.

foreign does not apply to loanwords or to foreign names. It applies to quoted foreign text incorporated in a sentence/discourse of the host language (unless we want to and know how to annotate the internal structure according to the syntax of the foreign language).

I guess that c' est la vie
nsubj(guess-2, I-1)
ccomp(guess-2, c'-4)
mark(c'-4, that-3)
foreign(c'-4, est-5)
foreign(c'-4, la-6)
foreign(c'-4, vie-7)

The indirect object of a verb is any nominal phrase that is a core argument of the verb but is not its subject or direct object. The prototypical example is the recipient of ditransitive verbs of exchange:

She gave me a raise
iobj(gave, me)

However, many languages allow other semantic roles as additional objects. The most common case is allowing benefactives, but some languages allow other roles. Examples include instruments, such as in the Kinyarwanda example below, or comitatives. At the other extreme, some languages lack all indirect objects.

Umukoóbwa a-ra-andik-iish-a íbárúwa íkárámu \n girl 1-PRS-write-APPL-ASP letter pen
dobj(a-ra-andik-iish-a, íbárúwa)
iobj(a-ra-andik-iish-a, íkárámu)

In languages distinguishing morphological cases, the indirect object will often be marked by the dative case. However, verb valency may occasionally dictate that the direct object is in dative, or that the indirect objects shall take various other forms.

In the following Czech example, the verb takes two arguments, both are nouns in the accusative case. One of them is direct object (patient), the other is indirect (addressee). It is parallel to how the English translation would be annotated (where there is no morphological case marking) and also to verbs of giving (consider a similar sentence, he gave my daughter a class of maths).

On učí mou dceru matematiku . \n He teaches my daughter.Acc maths.Acc .
dobj(učí, matematiku)
iobj(učí, dceru)
dobj(teaches, maths.Acc)
iobj(teaches, daughter.Acc)

In general, if there is just one object, it should be labeled dobj, regardless of the morphological case or semantic role. For example, in English, teach can take either the subject matter or the recipient as the only object, and in both cases it would be analyzed ad the dobj:

She teaches introductory logic
dobj(teaches, logic)

She teaches the first-year students
dobj(teaches, students)

This is consistent with the analysis of Huddleston and Pullum (2002) “The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language”, chapter 4 section 4 (p. 251). As they note, it is no different to the same semantic role being sometimes the subject and sometimes the object in intransitive/transitive alternations. The one exception is when there is a clausal complement. Then the clausal complement is regarded as a “clausal direct object” and an object nominal will be an iobj, parallel to the simple ditransitive case:

She told the students that they needed to study this evening
iobj(told, students)
ccomp(told, needed)

She told the students the plan
iobj(told, students)
dobj(told, plan)

If there are two or more objects, one of them should be dobj and the others should be iobj. In such cases it is necessary to decide what is the most directly affected object (patient). If possible, language-specific documentation should help identify direct and indirect objects.

The list relation is used for chains of comparable items. In lists with more than two items, all items of the list should modify the first one. Informal and web text often contains passages which are meant to be interpreted as lists but are parsed as single sentences. Email signatures often contain these structures, in the form of contact information: the different contact information items are labeled as list; the key-value pair relations are labeled as appos.

Steve Jones Phone: 555-9814 Email: jones@abc.edf
name(Steve-1, Jones-2)
list(Steve-1, Phone:-3)
list(Steve-1, Email:-5)
appos(Phone:-3, 555-9814-4)
appos(Email:-5, jones@abc.edf-6)

Another place where list has been used is for a sequence of attributes or descriptive terms used as the title line of a review (such as product or restaurant reviews, etc.:

Long Lines , Silly Rules , Rude Staff , Ok Food
list(Lines, Rules)
list(Lines, Staff)
list(Lines, Food)

However, list should not be over-used. If a construction can be easily analyzed using the grammatical relations of standard sentences, such as when there is overt coordination, then it should be analyzed with these more standard relations, even if it is laid out as a list typographically.

A marker is the word introducing a finite clause subordinate to another clause. For a complement clause, this is words like [en] that or whether. For an adverbial clause, the marker is typically a subordinating conjunction like [en] while or although. The mark is a dependent of the subordinate clause head. In a relative clause, it is a normally uninflected word, which simply introduces a relative clause, such as [he] še. (In this last use, one needs to distinguish between relative clause markers, which are mark from relative pronouns, which fill a regular verbal argument or modifier grammatical relation.

Forces engaged in fighting after insurgents attacked
mark(attacked, after)

He says that you like to swim
mark(swim, that)

Er kam wieder , um das Werk zu Ende zu bringen \n He came again , so-that the work to end to bring
mark(bringen, um)
mark(bringen, zu-10)
mark(bring, so-that)
mark(bring, to-22)

The multi-word expression (modifier) relation is one of the three relations (compound, mwe, name) for compounding. It is used for certain fixed grammaticized expressions that behave like function words or short adverbials.

The scope of mwe annotation corresponds roughly to the fixed expressions category of Sag et al., but excludes any relations in scope of name or compound. Additionally, limited morphosyntactic variation may be allowed for MWEs in exceptional cases.

I like dogs as well as cats
mwe(as-4, well-5)
mwe(as-4, as-6)

He cried because of you
mwe(because, of)

Je préfère prendre un dessert plutôt qu' une entrée \n I prefer getting a dessert rather than an appetizer
mwe(plutôt, qu')

Multiword expressions are annotated in a flat, head-initial structure, in which all words in the expression modify the first one using the mwe label.

name is one of the three relations for compounding in UD (together with compound and mwe). It is used for proper nouns constituted of multiple nominal elements. For example, name would be used between the words of Hillary Rodham Clinton, New York, or Carl XVI Gustaf but not to replace the usual relations in a phrasal or clausal name like The king of Sweden or the novels The Lord of the Rings and Captured By Aliens. Words joined by name should all be part of a minimal noun phrase; otherwise regular syntactic relations should be used. This is basically similar to the treatment of noun compounds with compound, except that in many cases parts of the name may be another nominal element such as an adjective (United Airlines).

In general, names are annotated in a flat, head-initial structure, in which all words in the name modify the first one using the name label.

Carl XVI Gustaf
name(Carl-1, Gustaf-3)
name(Carl-1, XVI-2)

For organization names with clear syntactic modification structure, the dependencies should reflect the syntactic modification structure using regular syntactic relation, as in:.

Natural Resources Conservation Service
amod(Resources-2, Natural-1)
compound(Conservation-3, Resources-2)
compound(Service-4, Conservation-3)

In addition, regular syntactic relations are used: (i) for a modifying determiner or (ii) to connect together the words of a description or name which involve embedded prepositional phrases, sentences, etc.

Le Japon
det(Japon-2, Le-1)

Ludwig van Beethoven
case(Beethoven, van)

Miguel de Cervantes y Saavedra
conj(Cervantes, Saavedra)
cc(Cervantes, y)
case(Cervantes, de)

The king of Sweden
det(king-2, The-1)
nmod(king-2, Sweden-4)
case(Sweden-4, of-3)

Río de la Plata
case(Plata-4, de-2)
det(Plata-4, la-3)
nmod(Río-1, Plata-4)

In the case of proper entities named after people, e.g. Leland Stanford Jr. University, the name relation should only be used inside the person name, with the rest of the construction analyzed compositionally using normal syntactic relations:

Leland Stanford Jr. University
compound(University-4, Leland-1)
name(Stanford-2, Leland-1)
name(Jr.-3, Leland-1)

nmod is a noun (or noun phrase) functioning as a non-core (oblique) argument or adjunct. This means that it functionally corresponds to an adverbial when it attaches to a verb, adjective or other adverb. But when attaching to a noun, it corresponds to an attribute, or genitive complement (the terms are less standardized here).

The nmod relation can be further specified by the case. In conjunction with the case relation, it provides a uniform analysis for:

• the possessive alternation:

the Chair 's office
det(Chair-2, the-1)
nmod(office-4, Chair-2)
case(Chair-2, 's-3)

the office of the Chair
det(office-2, the-1)
nmod(office-2, Chair-5)
case(Chair-5, of-3)
det(Chair-5, the-4)

• variant forms with case, a preposition or a postposition, as in Finnish for example:

etsiä ilman johtolankaa \n to_search without clue.PARTITIVE
nmod(etsiä, johtolankaa)
case(johtolankaa, ilman)

etsiä taskulampun kanssa \n to_search torch.GENITIVE with
nmod(etsiä, taskulampun)
case(taskulampun, kanssa)

etsiä johtolangatta \n to_search clue.ABESSIVE
nmod(etsiä, johtolangatta)

• the dative alternation where the prepositional construction gets a similar analysis to the double object construction:

give the children the toys
dobj(give, toys)
iobj(give, children)

give the toys to the children
dobj(give, toys)
nmod(give, children)
case(children, to)

# give the toys to the children
1     donner    donner   VERB   _   VerbForm=Inf               0   root   _   give
2     les       le       DET    _   Definite=Def|Number=Plur   3   det    _   the
3     jouets    jouet    NOUN   _   Gender=Masc|Number=Plur    1   dobj   _   toys
4-5   aux       _        _      _   _                          _   _      _   _
4     à         à        ADP    _   _                          6   case   _   to
5     les       le       DET    _   Definite=Def|Number=Plur   6   det    _   the
6     enfants   enfant   NOUN   _   Gender=Masc|Number=Plur    1   nmod   _   children

nmod is also used for temporal nominal modifiers:

Last night , I swam in the pool
nmod(swam, night)

A nominal subject (nsubj) is a nominal which is the syntactic subject and the proto-agent of a clause. That is, it is in the position that passes typical grammatical test for subjecthood, and this argument is the more agentive, the do-er, or the proto-agent of the clause. (See csubj for when the subject is clausal. See nsubjpass and csubjpass for when the subject is not the proto-agent argument due to valence changing operations.) This nominal may be headed by a noun, or it may be a pronoun or relative pronoun, or in ellipsis contexts, other things such as an adjective.

The nsubj role is only applied to semantic arguments of a predicate. When there is an empty argument in a grammatical subject position (sometimes called a pleonastic or expletive), it is labeled as expl. If there is then a displaced subject in the clause, as in the English existential there construction, it will be labeled as nsubj.) The governor of the nsubj relation might not always be a verb: when the verb is a copular verb, the root of the clause is the complement of the copular verb, which can be an adjective or noun, including a noun marked by a preposition, as in the examples below.

Clinton defeated Dole
nsubj(defeated, Clinton)

The car is red .
nsubj(red, car)

Sue is a true patriot .
nsubj(patriot, Sue)

We are in the barn .
nsubj(barn, We)

Agatha is in trouble .
nsubj(trouble, Agatha)

There is a ghost in the room .
expl(is, There)
nsubj(is, ghost)

These links present the many viewpoints that existed .
acl(viewpoints, existed)
nsubj(existed, that)

A numeric modifier of a noun is any number phrase that serves to modify the meaning of the noun with a quantity.

Sam ate 3 sheep
nummod(sheep, 3)

Sam spent forty dollars
nummod(dollars, forty)

Sam spent $ 40
nummod($, 40)

Note that indefinite quantifiers such as few, many are tagged u-pos/DET rather than u-pos/NUM. Therefore their relation to the quantified noun is not nummod but det:

Sam ate many sheep
det(sheep, many)

Let 's face it we 're annoyed
parataxis(Let, annoyed)

The guy , John said , left early in the morning
parataxis(left, said)

Bearded dragons are sight hunters , they need to see the food to move .
parataxis(hunters, need)

Divided world the CIA
amod(world, Divided)
parataxis(world, CIA)
det(CIA, the)

The guy , John said , left early in the morning
parataxis(left, said)

there are paraphrases that convey essentially the same meaning but with a different syntactic structure. When the reported speech is embedded in a subordinate clause (with or without an overt complementizer that), the subordinate clause is a ccomp of the speech verb. When the reported speech follows the speech verb and is separated by a colon, the reported speech forms a main clause that attaches to the preceding main clause with a parataxis relation, hence with the speech verb as its head. However, when the speech verb occurs as a medial or final parenthetical, the relation is reversed and the speech verb is treated as a parataxis of the reported speech. This analysis is not uncontroversial but follows many authorities, such as Huddleston and Pullum (2002), The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (see chapter 11, section 9).

John said that the guy left early in the morning .
ccomp(said, left)

John said the guy left early in the morning .
ccomp(said, left)

John said : “ The guy left early in the morning . ”
parataxis(said, left)

“ The guy left early in the morning ” , John said .
parataxis(left, said)

The guy left early in the morning , John said .
parataxis(left, said)

The guy , he said , left early in the morning .
parataxis(left, said)

An argument for this analysis is that in the cases analyzed as embedding, the entire clause can be further embedded (I was taken aback when John said the guy left early in the morning.), while this is not possible with medial or final placement of the speech verb (*I was taken aback when the guy left early this morning, John said.).

News article bylines

We have used the parataxis relation to connect the parts of a news article byline. There does not seem to be a better relation to use.

Washington ( CNN ) :
parataxis(Washington, CNN)

Interjected clauses

Single word or phrase interjections are analyzed as discourse, but when a whole clause is interjected, we use the relation parataxis.

Calafia has great fries ( they are to die for ! )
parataxis(has, are)

Just to let you all know Matt has confirmed the booking for 3rd Dec is OK .
parataxis(confirmed, let)

In the second example, we treat the second half as the head of the dependency because the first half feels like a whole clause interjection, not like the main clause of the utterance.

Tag questions

We also use the parataxis relation for tag questions such as isn’t it? or haven’t you?.

It 's not me , is it ?
parataxis(me, is)

Go home !
punct(Go, !)

Tokens with the relation u-dep/punct always attach to content words (except in cases of ellipsis) and can never have dependents. Since punct is not a normal dependency relation, the usual criteria for determining the head word do not apply. Instead, we use the following principles:

1. A punctuation mark separating coordinated units is attached to the first conjunct.
2. A punctuation mark preceding or following a subordinated unit is attached to this unit.
3. Within the relevant unit, a punctuation mark is attached at the highest possible node that preserves projectivity.
4. Paired punctuation marks (quotes and brackets) should be attached to the same word unless that would create non-projectivity. This word is usually the head of the phrase enclosed in the paired punctuation.

Marie went to Paris and Miriam went to Prague
nsubj(went-2, Marie-1)
root(root-0, went-2)
nmod(went-2, Paris-4)
case(Paris-4, to-3)
cc(went-2, and-5)
nsubj(went-7, Miriam-6)
conj(went-2, went-7)
case(Prague-9, to-8)
nmod(went-7, Prague-9)

Marie went to Paris and Miriam to Prague
nsubj(went-2, Marie-1)
root(root-0, went-2)
nmod(went-2, Paris-4)
case(Paris-4, to-3)
cc(went-2, and-5)
case(Prague-8, to-7)

Marie went to Paris and Miriam to Prague
nsubj(went-2, Marie-1)
root(root-0, went-2)
nmod(went-2, Paris-4)
case(Paris-4, to-3)
cc(went-2, and-5)
remnant(Marie-1, Miriam-6)
case(Prague-8, to-7)
remnant(Paris-4, Prague-8)

John won bronze , Mary silver , and Sandy gold
nsubj(won-2, John-1)
dobj(won-2, bronze-3)
remnant(John-1, Mary-5)
remnant(Mary-5, Sandy-9)
remnant(bronze-3, silver-6)
remnant(silver-6, gold-10)

Note in particular that (unlike for conj), remnant uses a chaining analysis where each subsequent remnant depends on the immediately preceding remnant/correlate. The reason for this is that otherwise in a sentence with 2 or more chained ellipses the dependency structure would no longer track which remnants go together. It would become impossible to determine whether Mary won silver and Sandy gold, or Mary won gold and Sandy silver.

It is also possible that the incomplete part precedes the complete one in the sentence [de]:

während 78 Prozent sich für Bush und vier Prozent für Clinton aussprachen \n while 78 percent REFL for Bush and four percent for Clinton spoke-out
nsubj(aussprachen, Prozent-9)
nsubj(spoke-out, percent-22)
nmod(aussprachen, Clinton-11)
nmod(spoke-out, Clinton-24)
remnant(Prozent-9, Prozent-3)
remnant(percent-22, percent-16)
remnant(Clinton-11, Bush-6)
remnant(Clinton-24, Bush-19)

The remnant relation is used when no predicational material is present. In contrast, in right-node-raising (RNR) and VP-ellipsis constructions in which some kind of predicational or verbal material is still present, the remnant relation is not used. In RNR, the verbs are coordinated and the object is a dobj of the first verb:

John bought and ate an apple
nsubj(bought-2, John-1)
cc(bought-2, and-3)
conj(bought-2, ate-4)
det(apple-6, an-5)
dobj(bought-2, apple-6)

In VP-ellipsis, we keep the auxiliary as the head, as shown below:

John will win gold and Mary will too
nsubj(win-3, John-1)
aux(win-3, will-2)
dobj(win-3, gold-4)
cc(win-3, and-5)
conj(win-3, will-7)
nsubj(will-7, Mary-6)
advmod(will-7, too-8)

He says that you like to swim
xcomp(like, swim)

Sue asked George to respond to her offer
xcomp(asked, respond)

You look great
xcomp(look, great)

I started to work there yesterday
xcomp(started, work)

I consider him a fool
xcomp(consider, fool)

I consider him honest
xcomp(consider, honest)

We expect them to change their minds
xcomp(expect, change)

The boss said to start digging
ccomp(said, start)

Píšu , protože jsem to slíbil . \n I-write , because I-have it promised .
advcl(Píšu, slíbil)
advcl(I-write, promised)

Slíbil jsem psát . \n Promised I-have to-write .
xcomp(Slíbil, psát)
xcomp(Promised, to-write)

She declared the cake beautiful .
nsubj(declared, She)
dobj(declared, cake)
xcomp(declared, beautiful)

She declared the cake beautiful .
nsubj(declared, She)
dobj(declared, cake)
xcomp(declared, beautiful)
nsubj(beautiful, cake)

jmenovat někoho generálem \n to-appoint someone as-a-general
dobj(jmenovat, někoho)
xcomp(jmenovat, generálem)

The result is that in She entered the room sad, sad will depend on She and the relation will be acl instead of xcomp.