 The nature and reliability of Marius's work, and the extent to which the earlier part of the "HA" draws upon it, are two vexed questions among the many problems that the "HA" continues to pose for students of Roman history and literature.It is more or less agreed that Marius Maximus the biographer is identical with one of the most successful senators of the Severan dynasty whose career is known from inscriptions, namely Lucius Marius Maximus Perpetuus Aurelianus, twice consul and once Prefect of the City of Rome.His family may have hailed from Africa and was not senatorial; his father, L. Marius Perpetuus, was an Equestrian procurator in Gaul but evidently secured entry to the senatorial order for his son as a "novus homo".