Anna Comnena
daughter of Alexius Comnenus I., Byzantine emperor.
She was born in 1083, and died in 1148.
After her father's death she endeavored to secure the succession to her husband, Nicephorus Briennius, but was baffled by his want of energy and ambition. She wrote (in Greek) a life of her father, ANN ARBOR Alexius, which, in the midst of much fulsome panegyric, contains some valuable and interesting information.
ANNA IVANOVNA (-wan-ö'na), Empress of Russia, born in 1693; the daughter of Ivan, the elder half-brother of Peter the Great. She was married in 1710 to the Duke of Courland, in the following year was left a widow, and, in 1730 ascended the throne of the Czars on the condition, proposed by the Senate, that she would limit the absolute power of the czars, and do nothing without the advice of the Council. This promise she did not keep. She chose as her favorite, Ernest John von Biren of Biron, who was soon all-powerful in Russia. Leading nobles were executed and thousands of men were sent to Siberia. In 1737 Anna forced the Courlanders to choose Biren as their duke, and nominated him at her death Regent of the Empire during the minority of her grand-nephew, Prince Ivan of Brunswick. Anna died in 1740.
ANNAM. See ANAM.