wives: Vida from Courland; Olga from Smolensk; and Jewna from Polotsk, who was Eastern Orthodox and died in 1344 or 1345. Most modern historians and reference works say Gediminas' wife was Jewna, dismissing Vida and Olga as fictitious, since no sources other than this chronicle mention the other two wives. The historian S. C. Rowell argues that Gediminas' wife was a local pagan duchess, on the grounds that his marriage to a princess from a neighboring land would have been noted in other contemporary sources, and that the reliability of the Bychowiec Chronicle has been questioned. An argument has been advanced that Gediminas had two wives, one pagan and another Orthodox. This case is supported only by the Jüngere Hochmeisterchronik, a late 15th-century chronicle, mentioning Narimantas as half-brother to Algirdas. Other historians support this claim by arguing this would explain Gediminas' otherwise mysterious designation of a middle son, Jaunutis, as his succession would be understandable if Jaunutis were the first-born son of Gediminas and a second wife. Children and grandchildren Because none of Gediminas' siblings had strong heirs, Gediminas and his children were in a favorable position to assume and consolidate power in the Grand Duchy. Gediminas had at least five daughters and seven sons, whose shrewd marriages helped to consolidate and expand the Grand Duchy's influence to areas east and west of Lithuania. Those marriages speak to Gediminas' diplomatic talent in building alliances with the neighboring states that shared his goals to destroy the Teutonic Order and contain the growing power of Moscow and Poland. The marriages of Gediminas' sons helped to consolidate the dynasty's power over various territories already within the Grand Duchy, while his daughters' and granddaughters' marriages worked to strengthen Lithuanian relationships with neighboring powers. Daughters In 1320 Maria married Dmitri of Tver, ruler of a Rus' principality. The marriage took place soon after Mikhail Yaroslavich, Dmitri's father, was killed; his sons were searching for strong allies against Yury of Moscow, their principal competitor for the throne of Vladimir and All Rus'. After 1327 Lithuania began to supplant Tver as Moscow's chief rival for supremacy in the Rus'. When Tver sought to rival Moscow, it needed an alliance with Lithuania. Dmitri was killed in 1325 and Maria never remarried. Maria's brother-in-law, Alexander I, nevertheless maintained friendly relationships with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and his daughter Uliana married Algirdas, the son of Gediminas, who continued the