Maria Palaiologina

Maria Palaiologina (; died 1505) was, according to Russian sources, a daughter of Andreas Palaiologos and the niece of Sophia Palaiologina, the grand princess of Moscow by marriage to Ivan III of Russia. Maria is only mentioned in Russian chronicles and is thus of unverified historicity; the lack of recorded children of Andreas in western sources has often been seen as evidence that he was childless. According to the chronicles, Maria married the Russian noble , the prince of Vereya, in approximately 1480, but the two escaped into exile to Lithuania in 1483 due to an incident involving the jewels of Maria of Tver, the former grand princess of Moscow. History Background Maria Palaiologina is described in Russian sources, for instance the near-contemporary Sofia Chronicle, as a daughter of Andreas Palaiologos, otherwise commonly believed by modern historians not to have left any descendants. Andreas Palaiologos was the son of Thomas Palaiologos and the nephew of Constantine XI Palaiologos, the final Byzantine emperor. After the fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1453 and Thomas' lands in the Despotate of the Morea in 1460, Thomas and his family escaped into exile. Andreas lived in Rome, provided for by the papacy, from 1465 to his death in 1502, and claimed to be the rightful Byzantine emperor from 1483 onwards.