Alfred j freddoso ("journal of philosophy", 1983) proposed a model for william of ockham's attempt to allow that every true statement about the past is necessary while avoiding fatalism. i argue that freddoso's model cannot be ockham's for reasons that bring out ockham's opposition to metaphysical density and show that ockhamist entities rely on their temporal spread for features which other philosophers would explain by appeal to properties (or dispositions) existing in the entity. i suggest that ockham's own response to (...) the conflict between necessity of the past and fatalism was a verbal maneuver unsupported by any clear semantical model. (shrink)