Julius Marinus was the father of Roman Emperor

Philip the Arab Philip I (; – September 249), commonly known as Philip the Arab, was Roman emperor from 244 to 249. After the death of Gordian III in February 244, Philip, who had been Praetorian prefect, rose to power. He quickly negotiated peace with the S ...

and Philip's brother

Gaius Julius Priscus Gaius Julius Priscus (fl. 3rd century) was a Roman soldier and member of the Praetorian Guard in the reign of Gordian III. As the brother of Roman Emperor Philip the Arab, he was also Prefect of Mesopotamia and Procurator of Macedonia. Priscus w ...

Life

He was

deified Apotheosis (, ), also called divinization or deification (), is the glorification of a subject to divine levels and, commonly, the treatment of a human being, any other living thing, or an abstract idea in the likeness of a deity. The origina ...

by his son. Scholar Pat Southern writes that this deification was unusual because Marinus was not an emperor, but it gave Philip's reign more legitimacy. He was a Roman citizen from what is today

Shahba Shahba ( / ALA-LC: ''Shahbā'') is a city located south of Damascus in the Jabal el Druze in As-Suwayda Governorate of Syria, but formerly in the Roman Empire, Roman province of Arabia Petraea. Known in Late Antiquity as Philippopolis (in Arabia ...

, about southeast of

Damascus Damascus ( , ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in the Levant region by population, largest city of Syria. It is the oldest capital in the world and, according to some, the fourth Holiest sites in Islam, holiest city in Islam. Kno ...

; in the

Trachonitis The Lajat (/ALA-LC: ''al-Lajāʾ''), also spelled ''Lejat'', ''Lajah'', ''el-Leja'' or ''Laja'', is the largest lava field in southern Syria, spanning some 900 square kilometers. Located about southeast of Damascus, the Lajat borders the Haura ...

district and then in the

Roman province The Roman provinces (, pl. ) were the administrative regions of Ancient Rome outside Roman Italy that were controlled by the Romans under the Roman Republic and later the Roman Empire. Each province was ruled by a Roman appointed as Roman g ...

Arabia Petraea Arabia Petraea or Petrea, also known as Rome's Arabian Province or simply Arabia, was a frontier Roman province, province of the Roman Empire beginning in the 2nd century. It consisted of the former Nabataean Kingdom in the southern Levant, th ...

. In life Marinus was possibly of some importance.Meckler, ''Philip the Arab'' By descent from Marinus, Philip held

Roman citizenship Citizenship in ancient Rome () was a privileged political and legal status afforded to free individuals with respect to laws, property, and governance. Citizenship in ancient Rome was complex and based upon many different laws, traditions, and cu ...

.''Riverside Dictionary Of Biography'', Houghton-Mifflin, London 2004: p603.

References

3rd-century Romans 3rd-century Arab people 3rd-century Asian people Deified ancient Roman men Marinus, Julius Philip the Arab {{AncientRome-bio-stub