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in cursu, ‘in mid career,’ a metaphor of very frequent occurrence in Ovid. Cf. X. 400, “fortuna domusque sospes et in cursu est.” So it is used with vox, spes, furor, in Fast.V. 245, ib. VI. 362, Rem. Am. 119. So in the plural, cursibus in mediis Her. XVI. 320. maxima rerum, ‘queen of the world.’ For similar uses of superlatives with rerum cf. XIV. 489, Ars Amat. i.359 “laetissima rerum” (of a lady), G. II. 534, “rerum facta est pulcherrima Roma”, Her.IX. 107“maxime rerum”, ib. IV. 125, “pulcherrime rerum”, Hor. Sat.I. ix. 4“dulcissime rerum”. An instance with the neuter is XII. 502 (of the Centaurs) “quid quod fortissima rerum in nobis natura duplex animalia iunxit?” Prof. Palmer remarks (on Hor. L. c.), ‘In such phrases rerum is used as a stronger expression than hominum, and its gender is ignored, being treated as a singular = the world.’ It seems unsatisfactory to limit the genitive thus strictly to the partitive relation: perhaps we must not follow Conington in calling it (on G. II. 15, “nemorum quae maxuma frondet aesculus” and so Aen.VII. 83) ‘a kind of local genitive,’ and comparing Aesch. Ag.509, “ὕπατος χώρας Ζεύς”. Cf. Milt. P. l. VIII. 414, ‘Supreme of things.’
Charles Simmons. Metamorphoseon XIII. xiv. The Metamorphoses of Ovid, Books XIII. and XIV. Edited, with introduction, analysis, and notes by Charles Simmons. New York. Macmillan. 1899.
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