Marcus

Marcus, Markus, or Márkus may refer to:

Places

Other uses

See also

Marcus (name)

Marcus (abbreviated M.) is a masculine given name of Ancient Roman pre-Christian origin derived either from Etruscan Marce of unknown meaning (possibly from the Etruscan "mar" which means "to harvest"), or referring to the god Mars. Because Mars was identified as the Roman god of War, the name 'Marcus' can by extension be taken to refer to Ares in the Greek pantheon.

The name is popular in Europe, particularly in Sweden, Norway, Italy and Germany, and increasingly, in the Netherlands. It is also popular in English language countries, although less common than the shortened variation 'Mark', associated with the Gospel writer Mark the Evangelist (Μάρκος). There are other variants. Marcus ranks in the top 100 most popular boy names in Australia, Canada, England, Scotland, Sweden, and Wales since the 1990s, as well as, the top 200 most popular boy names in the US since the 1960s.

Marcus developed as a patronymic or toponymic surname in Italy, southern France, and Spain around 1000 A.D., attributable to religious monasteries and sanctuaries named Sanctus Marcus (or its many variants). The surname was used as an identifier for area of origin. The first historical record of the surname was in the year 1390 in Biberach an der Riß, Germany.

Marcus (usurper)

Marcus (died 407) was a Roman usurper emperor (406–407) in Roman Britain.

Career

Marcus was a soldier in Roman Britain who was proclaimed Emperor by the army there some time in 406. He may have risen to power as a reaction to the increasing raids from abroad at a time when the Empire was withdrawing troops from its distant provinces like Britain to protect its heartland. There were too few troops capable of defending Britain at the time, as raiders such as the Irish, and records of raiders like Niall of the Nine Hostages show. Local troops, with ties to their home garrisons, are likely to have resisted being redeployed to Italy at a time of such instability in Britain; Marcus' elevation may have been a result of this or some other, unrecorded crisis. It has been conjectured that the revolt in Britain was aimed principally at Stilicho, the Emperor Honorius’s magister militum, who responded by allowing the Vandals and other Germanic tribes to cross the Rhine frontier in December 406.