Lucius Marcius Philippus (consul 38 BC)

Lucius Marcius Philippus
Silver denarius struck by Lucius Marcius Philippus, c. 56 BC.
Suffect Consul of the Roman Republic
In office
38 BC – 38 BC
Preceded byAppius Claudius Pulcher
Gaius Norbanus Flaccus
Succeeded byMarcus Vipsanius Agrippa
Lucius Caninius Gallus
Personal details
BornLucius Marcius Philippus
Unknown
SpouseAtia
ChildrenMarcia
Parents

Lucius Marcius Philippus was a Roman politician who was elected suffect consul in 38 BC. He was step-brother to the future emperor Augustus, as well as his uncle (his wife's sister was Atia Balba, mother of Augustus).

Life

First side of the image: O: diademed head of Ancus Marcius, lituus behind ANCVS
Second side of the image: R: equestrian statue on 5 arches of aqueduct (Aqua Marcia)

PHILIPPVS

A-Q-V-A-(MAR)

A member of the plebeian branch of the Marcia family, Philippus was the son of Lucius Marcius Philippus, the consul of 56 BC.[1] By 50 BC, he had possibly become an Augur, one of the priests of ancient Rome.[2] In 49 BC he was elected as Plebeian Tribune, where he vetoed the proposal to send Faustus Sulla, Pompey’s son-in-law, as propraetor to Mauretania, to persuade kings Bocchus II and Bogud to side with Pompey and abandon Julius Caesar.[3] In 44 BC he was elected praetor, and although he was granted a province to administer after his term had finished, he refused to accept the validity of the allotment of provinces agreed to in a Senate meeting of November 28, 44 BC.[4]

With his father's marriage to Atia, he became step-brother to Gaius Octavius, Julius Caesar's heir. His father used his influence to help Philippus to obtain the consulate as one of the suffect consuls of 38 BC; nevertheless, during his consulate Philippus did not declare himself openly for his step-brother in his rivalry with Mark Antony.[5] By 35 BC, he was appointed the proconsular governor of one of the two provinces of Hispania.[6] After serving there for two years, he returned to Rome, where he was awarded a triumph which he celebrated on April 27, 33 BC for his actions while governor.[7] With the spoils of his victories, he restored the Temple of Hercules Musarum in the Portico of Octavius, thereafter known as the Portico of Philippus (Porticus Philippi).[8] Augustus restored the adjacent Portico of Metellus, rededicating it as the Portico of Octavia.

Philippus did not appear to have any living sons to succeed him.[9] Philippus married Atia, daughter of Julia Minor and Marcus Atius Balbus and maternal aunt of Augustus.[10][11] They had a daughter, Marcia, who later married Paullus Fabius Maximus. Marcia had one son and possibly one daughter: Paullus Fabius Persicus and Fabia Numantina, who may have been the daughter of Maximus's brother Africanus Fabius Maximus.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Zmeskal 2009, p. 184.
  2. ^ Broughton, pg. 254
  3. ^ Holmes, pg. 2; Broughton, pg. 258
  4. ^ Broughton, pg. 321
  5. ^ Syme, pg. 229; Broughton, pg. 389
  6. ^ Broughton, pg. 407; Syme, pg. 239
  7. ^ Broughton, pg. 415; Syme, pg. 241
  8. ^ Syme, pg. 241; Broughton, pg. 415
  9. ^ Syme, pg. 496
  10. ^ Syme, Ronald (1989). The Augustan Aristocracy. Oxford: Oxford Clarendon Press. p. 194. ISBN 978-0-19-814731-2. The name evokes Atia, the mother of Caesar Augustus and her younger sister Atia, who married Marcius Philippus (suff. 38 BC), whence Marcia, a cousin of the Princeps. (Limited Preview of this page at Google Books)
  11. ^ Zmeskal 2009, p. 41.

Sources

  • Broughton, Thomas Robert Shannon (1952). The magistrates of the Roman republic. Vol. 2. New York: American Philological Association.
  • Syme, Ronald, The Roman Revolution (1939)
  • Holmes, T. Rice, The Roman Republic and the Founder of the Empire, Vol. III (1923)
  • Zmeskal, Klaus (2009). Adfinitas (in German). Vol. 1. Passau: Verlag Karl Stutz. ISBN 978-3-88849-304-1.