=11. SPATIARER HARENA.= The phrase is taken from Virgil _G_ I 388-89 (quoted in the previous note); Ovid imitates the passage again at _Met_ II 572-73 'lentis / passibus, ut soleo, summa _spatiarer harena_'. =12. VISA EST A TERGO PENNA DEDISSE SONVM.= 'I thought I heard a wing rustle behind me'. A similar advent of an unseen deity at _Met_ III 96-98 'uox subito audita est; neque erat cognoscere promptum / unde, sed audita est: "quid, Agenore nate, peremptum / serpentem spectas? et tu spectabere serpens"'. Compare as well _Met_ V 294-98 'Musa loquebatur: pennae sonuere per auras, / uoxque salutantum ramis ueniebat ab altis. / suspicit et linguae quaerit tam certa loquentes / unde sonent hominemque putat Ioue nata locutum; / ales erat'. =12. PENNA= _BMFHILT_ PINNA _C_. _Pinna_ and _penna_, perhaps from different roots, were confused even in antiquity. The ancient manuscripts of Virgil offer _pinna_ as the spelling even for the meaning 'wing', but Quintilian clearly took _penna_ as the correct spelling for this sense: 'quare ['therefore'] discat puer ... quae cum quibus cognatio; nec miretur cur ... a pinno quod est acutum [_sc_ fiat] securis utrimque habens aciem _bipennis_, ne illorum sequatur errorem qui, quia a pennis duabus hoc esse nomen existimant, pennas auium dici uolunt'. (I iv 12). =13. NEQVE ERAT= _CMHL_ NEC ERAT _BFIT_. Virgil had a very strong preference for _neque_ before words starting with a vowel, but Ovid did not follow this rule: compare _Met_ I 101 'nec ullis', 132 'nec adhuc', 223 'nec erit', 306 'nec ablato', and 322 'nec amantior'. However, it seems better to accept _neque_ as the true reading in view of the good manuscript support and the parallel at _Met_ III 96-97 'uox subita audita est (neque [_uar_ nec] erat cognoscere promptum / unde, sed audita est)'. =13. NEQVE ERAT CORPVS.= 'But there was no body'. _Neque_ (_nec_) represents _sed ... non_ as well as _et ... non_. It is one of Ovid's favourite devices to describe the aspect of gods when they appear to him, as at _Am_ III i 7-14 (Elegy and Tragedy), _Fast_ I 95-100 (Janus), _Fast_ III 171-72 (Mars), _Fast_ V 194 (Flora), _Fast_ V 637-38 (Tiber), and _EP_ III iii 13-20 (Amor). The only other passage where Ovid says he did not see the god is _Fast_ VI 251-54, but Vesta had no traditional appearance that Ovid could make use of: compare _Fast_ VI 298 'effigiem nullam Vesta ... habet'. The reason that Ovid did not describe Fama was that the picture of Fama as a winged monster which Virgil had made standard (_Aen_ IV 174-88) could not easily be integrated into the poem. The only description of Fama in Ovid is at _Met_ IX 137-39 'Fama loquax praecessit ad aures, / Deianira, tuas, quae ueris addere falsa / gaudet, et e minima sua per mendacia crescit'. At _Met_ XII 39-63 there is a memorable description of Fama's dwelling-place. Fama is also personified (but with no descriptions) at _EP_ II i 19-20 & II ix 3.