Ma'ximis, Ma'rius
is repeatedly cited as a weighty authority by the Augustan historians.
He appears to have written at great length the biographies of the Roman emperors, beginning with Trajan and ending with Elagabalus, and very probably, as Casaubon conjectures, flourished under Alexander Severus.
He is named with great respect by Ammianus Marcellinus, but is termed by Vopiscus (
Firm. 100.1) "homo omnium verhosissimus qui et mythistoricis se voluminibus implicavit." (See Spartian.
Hadrian. 2, Casaubon's note; Lamprid.
Alex. Sex. 30; Vulcat. Gallic.
Avid. Cass. 6, 9; Lamprid.
Commod. 1315; Spartian.
S. Sever. 15; Capitolin.
Albin. 3, 9, 12; Spartian.
Get. 2; Lamprid.
Alex. Sev. 5, 65, Elagab. 11.)
No distinct idea can be formed of the arrangement of the work from the manner in which it is quoted by Spartianus (
Get. 2), "de cujus vita et moribus in vita Severi Marius Maximus
primo scptenario satis copiose retllit."
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