Ma'rcia Gens
originally patrician, afterwards plebeian likewise. We also, but not so frequently, find the name written Martius.
This gens claimed to be descended from Ancus Marcius, the fourth king of Rome (
Suet. Jul. 6;
V. Max. 4.3.4;
Ov. Fast. 6.803); and hence one of its families subsequently assumed the name of Rex, and the heads of Numa Pompilius and Ancus Marcius were placed upon the coins of the gens. [See the coins under CENSORINUS and PHILIPPUS.] But notwithstanding the claims to such high antiquity made by the Marcii, no patricians of this name, with the exception of Coriolanus, are mentioned in the early history of the republic, and it was not till after the enactment of the Licinian laws that any member of the gens obtained the consulship.
The first Marcius who reached this dignity was C. Marcius Rutilus Censorinus, in B. C. 310.
The only patrician family in this gens, as is remarked above, was that of CORIOLANUS the names of the plebeian families in the time of the republic are CENSORINUS, CRISPUS, FIGULUS, LIBO, PHILIPPUS, RALLA, REX, RUFUS, RUTILUS, SEPTIMUS, SERMO, TREMULUS. The only cognomens which occur on coins are
Censorinus, Libo, Philippus. A few persons are mentioned without any surname: they are given under MARCIUS.
