Roman Quaestors - Marcus Marius (Paperback)

Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Marcus Marius was a quaestor of the Roman Republic in 76 BC and proquaestor under Quintus Sertorius's government in exile in Spain. Marius was sent by Sertorius to Mithradates of Pontus as an advisor and military commander in the Third Mithridatic War. He is named as or more likely confused with a Varius in Appian. See also: Maria (gens).No connection has been established between this Marius and Gaius Marius or the other contemporary Marii of Arpinum. M. Marius is supposed to have arrived in Spain in the company of Perperna, but no further association is recorded with the man who was the prime instigator of Sertorius's assassination a few years later. Given that Marcus Marius was among the senators who fled Sulla, his politics are not likely to have been antithetical to those of the better-known Marian populares. A passage in Orosius implies, but does not directly state, that he was on the list of the proscribed. He was certainly a fugas (), a fugitive or exile, in keeping with the "peculiar legal situation" of Sertorius's men, some of whom were proscripti, and others of whom were hostes publici, "public enemies." In both cases, their lives and property were forfeit, and their sons and grandsons lost the rights of citizenship, but the proscribed in addition had bounties on their heads. Coin of Mithradates VISertorius sent Marcus Marius as a military advisor and his representative to Mithradates during the protracted negotiations between the two over an alliance. By 75 BC, Mithradates offered to recognize Sertorius as head of the Roman state, and sent aid in the form of 3,000 talents (72 million sesterces) and a fleet of 40 ships; in return, he asked that Sertorius recognize his claims in Anatolia. Sertorius reserved in his own name Rome's c... More: http://booksllc.net/?id=26108437