Anna of Russia Anna of Russia Anna Ioannovna (; – ), also spelled Anna Ivanovna and sometimes anglicized as Anne, was regent of the duchy of Courland from 1711 until 1730 and then ruled as Empress of Russia from 1730 to 1740. Anna was born in Moscow as the daughter of Tsar Ivan V by his wife Praskovia Saltykova. Ivan V was co-ruler of Russia along with his younger half-brother Peter the Great, but he was mentally disabled and incapable of administering the country, and Peter effectively ruled alone. Ivan V died in February 1696, when Anna was only three years old, and
Catherine Alekseyevna of Russia Catherine Alekseyevna of Russia Tsarevna Catherine Alekseyevna (; 27 November 1658 - 1 May 1718) was the fifth daughter of Tsar Alexis of Russia and Maria Miloslavskaya, sister of Tsar Feodor III of Russia and Tsar Ivan V of Russia and half-sister of Tsar Peter the Great. Catherine was named after Saint Catherine of Alexandria. In accordance with the Muscovite custom for imperial princesses, she lived in seclusion and never married. During the Moscow uprising of 1682, however, Ivan Andreyevich Khovansky (Tararui) is alleged to have planned to marry Catherine to his son Andrey Ivanovich Khovanskii in order to place