(Demetrius), son of a prince of Moldavia. Disappointed by not succeeding his father in that dignity, held under the Ottoman Port, he went over with his army to the Czar Peter the great, against whom he had been sent by the Grand Signior: he figured himself in the Czar's service; and in the republic of letters, by a Latin history of the origin and decline of the Ottoman empire, &c. Died in 1723.

(Antiochus), esteemed the founder of the Russian poetry, was the youngest son of the preceding. Under the most ingenious professors, whom the czar had invited to Petersburgh, he learned mathematics, physic, history, moral philosophy, and polite literature; without neglecting the study of the Holy Scriptures, to which he had a great inclination. Scarce had he finished his academic course, when he printed a Concordance to the Psalms in the Russian language, and was elected member of the academy. The affairs of state, in which he was soon after engaged, did not make him neglect his literary pursuits. In order to make himself useful to his fellow-citizens, he composed his satires, to ridicule certain prejudices which had got footing among them. When but 23 years of age, he was nominated minister at the court of Great Britain; and his dexterity in the management of public affairs was as much admired, as his taste for the sciences. He had the same reputation in France, whither he went in 1738, in quality of minister plenipotentiary, and soon after was invested with the character of ambassador extraordinary. The wise and prudent manner in which he conducted himself during the different revolutions which happened in Russia during his absence, gained him the confidence and esteem of three successive princes. He died of a dropsy, at Paris, in 1744, aged 44. Besides the pieces already mentioned, he wrote, 1. Some fables and odes. 2. A translation of Horace's epistles into Russian verse. 3. A prose translation of Fontenelle's plurality of worlds; and, 4. Algarotti's dialogues on light. The abbe Guasco has written his life in French; and translated his satires into that language.