Polotsk

The Polotsk dynasty was the princely line that ruled the medieval Principality of Polotsk, a trading power on the Western Dvina. Descended from Iziaslav of Polotsk, son of Vladimir the Great, this senior Rurikid branch kept its distance from Kiev and reached its golden age under Vseslav, who reigned from 1044 to 1101 and built the Cathedral of Saint Sophia.

After Vseslav's death the principality fragmented into lesser appanages, weakened by wars with neighboring Rus' princes and the German crusaders in Livonia. Polotsk became a Lithuanian vassal in 1240 and was fully incorporated into the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1307.

Jewna is said in the later Bychowiec Chronicle to be a daughter of a prince of Polotsk and the Orthodox wife of Grand Duke Gediminas, though modern historians doubt whether she existed at all.