Name Anna Palaiologina | ||
Role Daughter of Andronikos Angelos Palaiologos | ||
Anna Palaiologina (Greek: Ἅννα Παλαιολογίνα) was a queen-consort (basilissa) of the Despotate of Epirus as wife of John II Orsini and regent for her son Nikephoros II Orsini. She later married the Lord of Valona, John Komnenos Asen.
Life
She was a daughter of the Byzantine aristocrat, the protovestiarios Andronikos Angelos Palaiologos, a grandson of the ruler of Epirus, Michael II Komnenos Doukas, and of the Byzantine emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos. She married the Despot of Epirus John II Orsini in ca. 1323. Together the couple had a son, Nikephoros II Orsini, and a daughter, Thomais Orsini. She poisoned her husband in 1337, and assumed the regency over her underage son, only for Epirus to be invaded and annexed by the Byzantines in 1338. Anna was carried off as a prisoner to Thessalonica, from where she escaped in 1341. She managed to reach the Epirote capital of Arta, but the local Byzantine governor, John Angelos, placed her under house arrest. When Epirus was conquered by the Serbians under Stefan Dušan in ca. 1347, Anna was set free. In ca. 1350 she married the Lord of Valona, John Komnenos Asen. Sometime after ca. 1363 she went to live with her daughter Thomais and her son-in-law, Simeon Uroš, at the latter's capital of Trikala.