Reconstruction and paleogenetic characterization of the genome of Princess Maria Vsevolozha, wife of Grand Prince Vsevolod the Big Nest

Grand Prince of Vladimir Vsevolod the Big Nest and his wife Maria Vsevolozha (Shvarnovna) had twelve children, eight of whom were sons; Grand Prince Alexander Yaroslavich Nevsky was their grandson. Two competing hypotheses exist regarding the origin of Maria Vsevolozha, attributing it to either Ossetian or Czech nobility. Maria Shvarnovna was buried in the Knyaginin Monastery in Vladimir, Russia. Although her remains were reinterred several times, they were never moved from the original burial location. During the 2015 restoration works, skeletal remains, presumably belonging to Maria Shvarnovna, were sampled for paleogenetic analysis in order to determine their origin. More than 144,000 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were identified. Their analysis demonstrated that the remains belong to a female carrying mitochondrial haplogroup U4b1a4 and unambiguously confirmed a third-degree biological relationship (great-grandmother–great-grandson) with Prince Dmitry Alexandrovich, the son of Grand Prince Alexander Yaroslavich Nevsky. This result fully corresponds to the genealogical relationships described in medieval chronicles. A multivariate statistical analysis of the genome revealed the two most probable proximal genetic sources of her origin: an Alan component, understood here in a broad cultural-historical sense encompassing populations of the Early and High Middle Ages, and an East Eurasian component. Among medieval populations, the genome of Maria Shvarnovna shows the closest genetic affinity to individuals associated with the Saltovo-Mayaki archaeological culture, characteristic of the Don forest-steppe region and resulting from the migration of Alan tribes, as well as to individuals from the Kara-Zhygach necropolis (14th century), whose genomes also consist of a dominant Alan and a minor East Eurasian component. Not only do the findings support the Alan hypothesis and reject the Czech origin of Maria Shvarnovna, but they also allow one to confidently assert the reliable genetic identification of early representatives of the Rurikid princely dynasty due to the confirmed biological relationship with her great-grandson Dmitry Alexandrovich.