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 I of Russia Mons had had an affair, but there is no evidence for this. Peter died (28 January 1725 Old Style) without naming a successor. Catherine represented the interests of the "new men", commoners who had been brought to positions of great power by Peter based on competence. A change of government was likely to favor the entrenched aristocrats. For that reason during a meeting of a council to decide on a successor, a coup was arranged by Menshikov and others in which the guards regiments with whom Catherine was very popular proclaimed her the ruler of Russia, giving her the title