daughter of the Emperor Alexius Com- Anna Ivanovna, was not more distinguished by her elevated rank than by her mental qualifications. Her superiority of mind began early to display itself. Despising the effeminacy and voluptuousness of the court in which she was educated, she directed her attention to literary pursuits. Indulging her favourite studies, she solicited the acquaintance of the more eminent philosophers of that period.

But the pursuits of literature did not induce her entirely to abandon society; she gave her hand to Nicephorus Briennius, a young nobleman of a respectable family. This accomplished woman was, however, actuated by unjustifiable ambition; and during the last illness of her father, she united with the Empress Irene in attempting to prevail upon that monarch to disinherit his own son, and give the crown to her husband. The affection and virtue of the father prevailed over female address and intrigue. But the ambition of Comnena was not subdued. She entered into a conspiracy to depose her brother; and when her husband displayed timidity and hesitation in this unjust enterprise, she exclaimed that "nature had mistaken their sexes, for he ought to have been the woman."

Either through the vigilance of her brother or the timidity of her husband, the treasonable plot was discovered, and Anna punished with the confiscation of all her property. It was afterwards, however, restored to her by the generosity of her brother. Ashamed of her base conduct, she retired from court, and never more possessed any influence there. Disappointed ambition took shelter among the walks of literature, and she employed her solitude in writing the history of her father's reign. This production is still extant, and forms a part of the celebrated collection of the Byzantine Historians. The stores of rhetoric are ransacked to embellish this work, and every effort made to enrich it with science; but its general character is rather that of an apology than of an impartial narrative. It must, however, be acknowledged that she is not more partial than many other Latin historians, and that her history contains many valuable facts and observations. The best edition is by Schoepen, 2 vols. 8vo.

Anna Ivanovna, Empress of Russia, daughter of Ivan, brother of Peter the Great, was born in 1693, and married in 1710 to the Duke of Courland, who died the following year. After the death of Peter II., in 1730, the supreme council of the empire offered the vacant throne of Russia to Anna on the following conditions. She was to govern according to the decisions of the supreme council, and she was not allowed without its consent either to declare war or to conclude peace, to impose new taxes, to grant any important office of the state, to dispose of crown lands, to contract a matrimonial alliance, or to nominate a successor to the throne. She was also not to punish any noble, or to confiscate any one's property without a legal sentence. Anna signed these conditions without any opposition; but after her arrival at Moscow, a numerous party jealous of the authority which this constitution, imitated from that of Sweden, gave to the supreme council, or rather to the families of the Princes Dolgorouki and Galitzin, of whose members it was chiefly composed, petitioned the empress to assume the autocracy of her predecessors. Anna immediately complied with this request, and the framers of the constitution were either banished to Siberia, or perished on the scaffold. Russia was governed during the whole reign of Anna by her favourite Biren, who was made by her influence Duke of Courland, in a most tyrannical and oppressive manner, so that, according to Russian authorities, twenty thousand victims of Biren's tyranny perished during Anna's reign of six years; and amongst them persons belonging to the highest ranks in the country. The principal events of Anna's reign were the voluntary restoration, in 1732, to Shah Nadir of the Russian provinces, Shirvan, Ghilan, and Mazanderan, acquired by Peter the Great, but which caused more expense than they gave of revenue to Russia; a Chinese embassy at St Petersburg, the only one that was ever sent to Europe; the assistance given to the Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, Augustus III., against his competitor Stanislaus Leszczinski, supported by France; a Russian army sent to the assistance of the Emperor Charles VI. against France; a war with Turkey from 1736 to 1739, which, notwithstanding several successful campaigns, gave no advantage to Russia at the conclusion of peace; and an advance made into central Asia by the establishment of the Russian protectorate over the khan of the Kirguizes, who, with the assistance of Russian officers, conquered Khiva, but fortunately for our present interests in the East, did not maintain himself there.

Anna died in 1740. Her reign is considered as a period of transition from the old Muscovite semibarbarian manners to the polish though not the civilization of the West. (v.e.)

Anna Perenna, an ancient Italian divinity, regarded as the giver of life, health, and plenty. In later times she was identified with Anna the sister of Dido, who threw herself into the Numicus, and was thenceforth worshipped as the nymph of that river. See Ovid. Fast. iii., Virg. Aeneid.iv., Macrobi. Sat. i. 12.