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ANNA COMNENA

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Originally appearing in Volume V02, Page 60 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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ANNA COMNENA , daughter of the See also:emperor Alexius I. See also:Comnenus, the first woman historian, was See also:born on the 1st of See also:December 1083. She was her See also:father's favourite and was care-fully trained in the study of See also:poetry, See also:science and See also:Greek See also:philosophy. But, though learned and studious, she was intriguing and ambitious, and ready to go to any lengths to gratify her longing for See also:power. Having marriecl an accomplished See also:young nobleman, Nicephorus See also:Bryennius, she See also:united with the empress See also:Irene in a vain See also:attempt to prevail upon her father during his last illness to disinherit his son and give the See also:crown to her See also:husband. Still undeterred, she entered into a See also:conspiracy to depose her See also:brother after his See also:accession; and when her husband refused to join in the enterprise, she exclaimed that " nature had mistaken their sexes, for he ought to have been the woman." The See also:plot being discovered, Anna forfeited her See also:property and See also:fortune, though, by the clemency of her brother, she escaped with her See also:life. Shortly afterwards, she retired into a See also:convent and employed her leisure in See also:writing the Alexiad—a See also:history, in Greek, of her father's life and reign (1o81–1118), supplementing the See also:historical See also:work of her husband. It is rather a See also:family See also:panegyric than a scientific history, in which the See also:affection of the daughter and the vanity of the author stand out prominently. Trifling acts of her father are described at length in exaggerated terms, while little See also:notice is taken of important constitutional matters. A determined opponent of the Latin See also:church and an enthusiastic admirer of the See also:Byzantine See also:empire, Anna Comnena regards the See also:Crusades as a danger both See also:political and religious. Her See also:models are See also:Thucydides, See also:Polybius and See also:Xenophon, and her See also:style exhibits the striving after Atticism characteristic of the See also:period, with the result that the See also:language is highly artificial. Her See also:chronology especiallyisdefective.

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Editions in See also:Bonn Corpus Scriptorum Hist. Byz., by J. Schopen and A. Reifferscheid (1839–1878), with Du Cange's valuable commentary; and Teubner See also:series, by A. Reifferscheid (1884). See also C. See also:Krumbacher, Geschichte der byzantinischen Literatur (2nd ed. 1897) ; C. See also:Neumann, Griechische Geschichtschreiber See also:im 12 Jahrhunderte (1888) ; E. Oster, Anna Komnena (See also:Rastatt, 1868–1871) ; See also:Gibbon, Decline and. Fall, ch. 48; See also:Finlay, Hist. of See also:Greece, iii. pp.

53, 128 (1877); P. See also:

Adam, Princesses byzantines (1893); See also:Sir See also:Walter See also:Scott, See also:Count See also:Robert of See also:Paris; L. du Sommerard, See also:Anne Comnene . . . See also:Agnes de See also:France (1907) ; C. Diehl, Figures byzantines (1906).

End of Article: ANNA COMNENA

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