Petrova Family

The Petrova Family (Bulgarian: Петров or Петрова) is one of the oldest and most powerful families in The Vampire Diaries, second only to the The Original Family in terms of current power. The family's earliest known relative was Amara, who was one of the two oldest and most powerful immortal beings to ever live along with her lover, Silas. The latter was also one of the most powerful witches of all time, perhaps only second to Qetsiyah in terms of raw magical power and ability to make powerful spells, although this is debatable.

Species

Anchor - Amara

Cure - Amara, Katerina

Doppelgänger - Amara, Tatia, Katerina, Elena

Ghost - Katerina, Elena

Human - Amara, Tatia, Mr. Petrov, Mrs. Petrova, Katerina's Sister, Katerina, Nadia, Isobel, Elena

Immortal - Amara

Passenger - Katerina

Traveler - Amara, Tatia, Mr. Petrov, Mrs. Petrova, Katerina's Sister, Katerina, Nadia

Vampire - Katerina, Nadia, Isobel, Elena

Family Members

Amara† (1st Century-11/14/13): Amara (Ancient Greek: Αμάρα) was born some time in the 1st century BC, during the Biblical Times. Her origins are from Ancient Greece. She is the oldest known ancestor of the Petrova family bloodline. Personality wise, Amara comes off as gentle, docile, and innocent, similar to that of Katherine before she became evil. Her age is unknown but it could be assumed that she was anywhere between fourteen to eighteen years old. As a human, she was the handmaiden to Qetsiyah, a very powerful witch. Amara fell deeply and passionately in love with a young, gifted and powerful warlock named Silas. Amara's love for Silas was so strong that she desired to be with him forever. However, her love for Silas was also strongly forbidden as Silas was engaged to be married to Qetsiyah. Therefore, Silas and Amara had a secret relationship. Silas also strongly loved Amara, so much that he desired immortality so that he and Amara could be together for eternity. Silas manipulated Qetsiyah into creating the spell of immortality with the intention of sharing the gift of eternal life with Amara, instead of Qetsiyah. However, after betraying Qetsiyah's trust after she created the spell, Qetsiyah became filled with anger and rage and she wanted revenge. After Silas and Amara drank the immortality elixir, Qetsiyah found the latter by faking her death and forced her to become the phyiscal Anchor to The Other Side, binding it's existence to her immortal life and desiccating her. After her awakening two thousand years later, the pain of her existence was too much to bear and she wished to die. She consumed the Cure in order to become mortal again. Amara reunites with Silas after 2,000 years of being apart from him adn she confesses her undying love for him but says that although she loves Silas, she desires to die just as much. Amara then asks Silas to kill her and end her 2,000 years of suffering. Silas is hesitant to do so at first but he then understands. Unexpectedly, Silas is killed by Stefan after he is stabbed with a blade. Silas passes through Amara as she was still currently the anchor before Qetsiyah had transferred the spell and made Bonnie the anchor instead. Amara, realizing that she has officially nothing to live for now that her beloved is dead and she has endured endless suffering for centuries and centuries, tells a dead Silas that their eternity together would start with her death. She then takes the same knife that killed Silas and stabs herself, killing her and ending her endless suffering. She is presumed to have found peace and has passed on to the afterlife where human souls go to once theyr die. Unfortunately for Amara, she did not get her dying wish which was to be reunited with Silas in true death as Silas ended up stuck on The Other Side with Qetsiyah, who ended up killing herself to be with Silas. It is currently unknown whether or not Amara reunited with Silas and found happiness in death with her true love after the Other Side deteriorated since Silas was seen being sucked into oblivion.

Tatia† (10th Century-?): Tatia was born during the 10th century and lived in what would be America during the 11th century and was a contemporary of the Mikaelson family. Tatia is first mentioned by Rebekah, though not by name, when she comments humorously that the original Petrova was much prettier than Elena. In Bringing Out The Dead, Klaus and Elijah reveal Tatia's name while dining with Damon and Stefan Salvatore. Tatia's doppelganger is Katherine Pierce. She was described as the most pure out of all the Petrova doppelgängers.

Tatia's Child† (10th Century-?): He/She was born around the turn of the 11th century. According to Elijah, Tatia had the child out of wedlock. Eventually, his/her descendants migrated to Europe. 

Katerina's Father† (1400s-?): He was a Bulgarian man who lived during the 15th century. He watched his daughter, Katerina, give birth to a daughter in the year 1490. He took the baby away from Katerina moments after she was born, ashamed of his daughter for bearing a child out of wedlock. He disowned Katerina and banished her to England. He was murdered by Klaus. According to Katerina, he was a Traveller.

Katerina's Mother† (1400s-?): She was a Bulgarian woman who lived during the 15th century. She helped her daughter, Katerina, give birth to a daughter in the year 1490. Although Katerina's mother was more sympathetic towards her daughter, Katerina's father immediately took the child away, ashamed of his daughter for having a child out of wedlock. her husband disowned Katerina and banished her to England. When Katerina returned to Bulgaria in the year 1492, she discovered that her mother, along with the rest of her family, had been murdered by Klaus.

Katerina's Sister† (1400s-?): She was a Bulgarian girl who lived during the 15th century. She helped her sister, Katerina, give birth to her daughter in 1490. When Katerina returned to Bulgaria in 1492, she discovered that her sister, along with the rest of her family, had been murdered by Klaus. She is a distant descendant of Amara. She is shown in a sketch attached to the Petrova book along with her mother and father.

Katerina Petrova/Katherine Pierce (6/5/1473-3/6/2014): Katerina Petrova, or Katherine Pierce (Bulgarian and Russian: Катерина Петрова) was born June 5th, 1473, in Bulgaria. In 1490, Katerina gave birth to a daughter, continuing the Petrova bloodline, but she was disowned for having a baby out of wedlock and the child was given away. She was then banished to England, where in 1492 she met the Lord Niklaus and his elder brother, the Lord Elijah. She made their acquaintance and was friendly toward them, unaware that the brothers were vampires and Klaus intended to use her in a sacrifice. Eventually Katerina discovered the truth about Klaus and his plan and fled. In order to thwart the plan to murder her, Katerina orchestrated her own death and transformed into a vampire. Having escaped England, she returned to Bulgaria later that year, only to discover that Klaus had murdered her entire family as revenge for her escape and suicide. Many centuries later, near the end of the American Civil War in the year 1864, Katerina had assumed the name Katherine Pierce and moved to Mystic Falls, where she lived with the Salvatore Family. The brothers Damon and Stefan competed for her affections, sparking a lifelong rivalry between them. Katherine eventually faked her own death in the interest of her lifelong career of evading Klaus, and managed to lay low for 145 years before returning to Mystic Falls. Her return to the town was motivated by the desire to secure the moonstone and the doppelgänger, both of which she intended to hand over to Klaus in exchange for her freedom. Katherine was recently turned back into a witch by her descendant and doppelganger; Elena. After her struggle to survive, in Gone Girl, Katherine was finally killed after being expelled from her host body.

Nadia Petrova† (1490-3/6/2014): Nadia (Bulgarian: Надя Петрова, Russian: Надежда Петрова, Greek: Νάντια Πέτροβα) was born in the year 1490 in Bulgaria. Katerina gave birth to her when she was a teenager between the ages of seventeen and eighteen. The daughter was born out of wedlock, much to Katerina's parent's disapproval, and she was given away to an unknown family. Her existence remained unknown throughout the supernatural world for many centuries; those concerned with the Petrova doppelgänger bloodline (namely Klaus) believed the line had ended when Katerina died and became a vampire. The truth did not emerge until the existence of another Petrova doppelgänger was discovered. She was shown to still be alive as a vampire for over 500 years. She made her identity known to Katherine in Monster's Ball. After a brief scuffle with Tyler Lockwood, Nadia was bitten and infected with werewolf venom, she died minutes before her mother in Gone Girl.

Isobel Flemming† (10/17/1975-4/7/2011): Isobel was a distant descendant of Katerina Petrova, and thus Amara, the world's first immortal woman. Born in 1978, she grew up in Mystic Falls and as a teenager had a child by John Gilbert. She gave her daughter up for adoption to John's brother Grayson and his wife Miranda, who named the girl Elena. Years later, Isobel was married to Alaric Saltzman when she asked Damon Salvatore to turn her into a vampire. After she became a vampire, Isobel went looking for Katherine, who helped her get a Lapis Lazuli necklace so she could walk in the daylight unharmed. Isobel helped Katherine research about the tomb vampires and got the Gilbert Device for John Gilbert to destroy the tomb vampires so that Katherine could return to Mystic Falls. Isobel was later compelled by Klaus to betray Katherine and then kill herself. She removed her daylight necklace in front of Elena and burned to death in the sun, ironically in front of her own tombstone.

Elena Gilbert (6/22/1992-Alive): Elena was born on June 22, 1992, in Mystic Falls, Virginia. She is the biological daughter of John Gilbert and Isobel Flemming, and is therefore a descendant of Katherine Pierce, to whom she bears a striking physical resemblance. Elena is also the final descendant and doppelganger of Amara, the originator of the Petrova doppelgänger bloodline. Elena's death and transition into a vampire ended the Petrova doppelgänger bloodline, as she has no descendants. 

Relatives

John Gilbert† (1970s-5/5/11): John met and fell in love with Isobel Flemming during their teenage years and they dated each other for a while. When Isobel was just 16 in the year 1992, Isobel told John that she was pregnant and John brought her to his older brother, Grayson Gilbert, who was the local pediatrician or OB/GYN, so that she could give birth to a daughter named Elena. Isobel left Elena in the good hands of Grayson and his wife Miranda, who didn't know that John was actually the biological father of Isobel's baby. John later sacrificed himself to resurrect Elena after Klaus had killed her for his ritual to trigger his werewolf gene, having Bonnie Bennett channel his life force into Elena's body once she died. Though John and Isobel never married, he is considered a relative of the family.

Alaric Saltzman (2/4/1976-Alive): Alaric was the history teacher and a vampire hunter is the former husband of Isobel Flemming and the stepfather of Elena Gilbert. It was later revealed that he thinks his wife, Isobel, was killed by a vampire, who he suspects to be Damon. Later he find out that Isobel wanted to become a vampire, and begged Damon to turn her, thus making Isobel a vampire. Isobel later came back and compelled Alaric to move on from her and Alaric begins a new life with Jenna Sommers and takes in Elena and Jeremy as his own by becoming their guardian. Alaric is turned into an Original by Esther. Alaric dies after Elena drowns in season three due to his sired connection to Elena. In the season five finale, Alaric is brought back to life by Liv.

Name

Petrov or Petroff (feminine: Petrova) is one of the most common surnames in Russia and Bulgaria.

The surname is derived from the given name Pyotr (Пётр, Russian) or Petar (Петър, Bulgarian), both of which are equivalent to the English name Peter. These names derive from the Greek "Πετρος" (Petros), meaning "stone".

Facts

In the books, Katherine is a member of the von Swartzschild Family, while in the series, she is a member of the Petrova Family.

In the books, the von Swartzchild family is German, but in the series the Petrovas are Bulgarian. This change was made because Nina Dobrev, who plays both Katherine Pierce and Elena Gilbert, has Bulgarian heritage; she was born there and speaks the language.

The Petrova family is referred to using the feminine form of the surname (masculine: Petrov) because so far only female members of the family are significant to the show's plot. The bloodline from Tatia to Elena Gilbert could be considered a Matriline.

Deleted scenes of the second season show other Petrova family members, but they are not canonical.

The Petrova Family is one of the oldest families in the TV Series.

It is worth noting that three members of the Petrova family have slept with Damon Salvatore: Katherine, Isobel, and Elena. Also, Elijah Mikaelson has kissed three members of the Petrova ladies: Tatia, Katherine and Elena.

While not confirmed, the Petrova Family may contain werewolf ancestry as Tatia was living among them during the 10th century.

Following Katherine and Nadia's death in Gone Girl, Elena Gilbert is the only known member of the Petrova family who is still alive.

Nina Dobrev has played three of the dopplegangers in one episode.

According to this interview with Nina Dobrev, Tatia s the first Doppelgänger of Amara. Julie Plec, the executive Producer to both The Vampire Diaries and The Originals has also stated that she is the Original Doppelgänger. Even the official synposis to Red Door gives Tatia that same title: Original Doppelgänger. Nina uses first doppelganger and original interchangeable when describing Tatia.

Last Updated on 11/5/14