forced an entry. In the palace John was acclaimed emperor. Irene, taken by surprise, was unable either to persuade her son to step down, or to induce Nikephoros to contend for the throne. However, this account of events, in particular the involvement of John's sister, in any palace coup attempt during the days around Alexios' death, has been disputed in a recent biography of Anna. Alexios died the night following his son's decisive move to take power. John refused to attend his father's funeral, despite the pleas of his mother, because he feared a counter-coup. However, in the space of a few days, his position seemed secure. Within a year of his accession, however, John II uncovered a conspiracy to overthrow him which implicated his mother and sister. Anna's husband Nikephoros had little sympathy with her ambitions, and it was his lack of support which doomed the conspiracy. Anna was stripped of her property, which was offered to the emperor's friend John Axouch. Axouch wisely declined and his influence ensured that Anna's property was eventually returned to her and that John II and his sister became reconciled, at least to a degree. Irene retired to a monastery and Anna seems to have been effectively removed from public life, taking up the less active occupation of historian. However, Nikephoros remained on good terms with his brother-in-law. One of the very few records of John's own words concerns the plot against him; he says that after ascending the throne, God "destroyed the cunning plots of my visible and invisible enemies and rescued me from every trap subjecting all my enemies under my feet". To safeguard his own succession, John crowned his young son Alexios as co-emperor around September 1119. Military and civil administration The family intrigues that challenged his succession to the throne probably contributed to John's approach to rulership, which was to appoint men from outside the imperial family to high office. This was a radical departure from the methods of his father, who had used the imperial family and its many connections to fill almost all senior administrative and military posts. John Axouch was John II's closest adviser and was his only intimate friend. Axouch was a Turk captured as a child at the Siege of Nicaea, who had been given as a gift to John's father. Emperor Alexios had thought him a good companion for his son, and so