Anna (1730-1740)

       The daughter of Tsar Ivan, Peter the Great’s brother and Praskovia Feodorovna Saltykova, Anna was born on January 28, 1693 and spent most of her time in the village of Ismailovo, near Moscow, where her mother lived. Anna was given in marriage to the Duke of Courtland, who dies soon after the wedding; the young widow stayed in Mitau. The Supreme Council offered Anna a crown when she was 37 , and she, having spent most of her life in Germany, was glad to accept their offer and to come back to opulent Russia. Although she promised to sign a document, leaving souvereign power to the council, Anna did not do it and tore the manuscript on March 4, 1730 and on April 28, 1730, she was crowned in the Dormition Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin. Surrounded with German grandees, the Empress decided to make Russia a prosperous country, and although she spent little time on affairs of state, her rule was a period of internal stability and successful foreign policy and she did her best to create the recognizably European court in the Northern Venice. Moved in St.Petersburg to restore its metropolitan status, Anna brought ministers from Germany, imported fashion and style from France, but also she founded Russia’s first military school for landed troops in Menshikov’s mansion, established St.Panteleimon’s church and a brick St.Simeon and Ann’s Church, as well as ordered a miracle-working icon of Our Lady of Kazan to be transferred from the Trinity cathedral to a recently built church in the Nevsky Avenue, which became popular as Kazan cathedral. Empress Anna died of kidney disease at the age of 47 in October 1740 and was buried in the Peter-and-Paul Cathedral; while the crown passed to Ivan VI and his mother Anna Leopoldovna.