ABSTRACT
Horace famously seems to be singling out the presentation of metamorphosis as unseemly more than once in the Ars Poetica. There is certainly a wide range of types of metamorphoses imaginable: the gods may look like, or arguably even change into, birds or other creatures; marine deities may go through a fixed cycle of changes to elude capture; people may be changed in shape into animals, plants, natural features or even heavenly bodies, often because of some unnaturally inhuman behaviour, and the process may often be envisaged gradually in stages. In fact, Ovid certainly addressed himself to at least some restraints: in only a minority of some 250 metamorphoses stories told or alluded to is the fantastic metamorphosis actually the centrepiece of the story. Many of the tales are more obviously concerned with love or seduction, and the metamorphoses are relegated to a few lines of tailpiece.
