Anastasia Komnene
Name
Anastasia Komnene is known in the mundane world as Veronica Lacquement.
Anastasia is a name she has loved and used many times for herself and is period to the 10th century of the Roman Byzantine empire. The last name of Komnene is, again, a period name to the time frame and region.
Interests
Anastasia has quite a few interests in the SCA, with her fingers in many different pots. However the main ones happen to be listed below...
Scribal Arts
While something of a recent active interest, the Scribal Arts have always fascinated me even before joining the SCA. As an art student in art history I was exposed to many different works, all of them fascinating. When I first joined the SCA it was one of the things that I really wished to get into, but every time I tried at first I could not get a straight answer on when the Scribal nights would be. Then of course there was the inevitable mundane life that would interfere.
When I moved to the Shire of Dragon's Mist I found a warm and welcoming place that has fulfilled one of my first wishes when I joined the SCA. I have painted a few charters now and am eagerly wanting to do more. Also I have made it a goal that for the Kingdom I will produce two original Award of Arms scrolls a year at least. This stems from the fact that while all the Charters are beautiful and well painted, having something done specifically for a person and their period is special and a challenge for me in terms of research. It allows me to delve into books looking at many examples of, let's say, 15th century french manuscripts. I take great pleasure in the Scribal arts and look forward to learning more as my skills progress.
Embroidery and Embellishment
This was another first for me when I came into the SCA and one I was able to indulge in right off. Pretty quickly I joined An Tir'a Embroidery and Embellishment Guild. While it still is developing and small, it is run by a great set of people and has great activities. One of the first things that I did was a largess for Pennsic War. It was a simple small pouch into which I sewed the queen's rose. I was very proud of it and glad to help out where I could, even if I couldn't be active in going to events at that time.
More recently my embroidery has not been a major focus for me, but I am slowly learning goldwork which is a beautiful form of embroidery. It is also one of the most challenging types I've come across yet and slowly my first piece, a set of cuffs on an underdress, are coming together. The other most recent thing I've begun is beadwork on my garb. It takes a lot of time to make sure the threads are secured enough to go through the washing machine, if they must, but it is well worth it. However I did learn a first and hard lesson; If you do beadwork and use metal beads, make sure the article of clothing is not dried on high as it will leave faint brown scorch marks. Luckily this piece is an underdress and where the marks occur will usually not be noticed because of tunica and overdresses.
Pewter Casting and Soapstone Carving
This is my most recent of interests and the one I am finding a lot of passion for. It started when I was asked to carve the site tokens for DMDT 2008. They were a huge hit and I had a lot of fun carving the mold. I then made volunteer tokens for Acorn War which were something of an experiment, but which I liked as well. I will also, very likely, be making Dragon's Mist Defender Tournament 2009 site tokens, as well as Dragon's Mist's Carnivale de Venezia. I have also volunteered to carve An Tir West War 2009's site tokens. I'm very excited about my upcoming projects for site tokens, but more for the other things I will eventually be creating.
Pewter Casting was used for many things in history. It used to be made of a mixture of lead and tin, but these days we use the lead free tin. We found out the hard way lead is bad for you, after all. The things it was made for varies from buttons to prayer tokens to hair pins to spoons and other eating utensils...there were so many things it was used to make. And it was not just cast with soap stone, but cuttlefish bone, charcoal, plaster and a wide variety of other methods were used. I am still researching this fantastic and fun way to add to my own embellishments and encourage anyone else who is curious to do so as well. An Tir has a Pewterers Guild which is filled with many talented and knowledgeable people.
Persona History
Undergoing continual development, so may change at whim, random, or with purpose.
Anastasia was the daughter of a lesser house of the western part of the Byzantine Empire. Born in Venice at the very end of the 12th century, her father is found to be in a profitable and unique situation. So it was that a husband and betrothal was not immediately sought and she was, to some extents, spoiled by both father and mother.
At the age of 14 her father went to join in the Crusades and as a result the family moved closer to the conflict, to Constantinople. There they resided and she was exposed to a different aspect of the culture in which she grew up in. It was here that she met and was eventually betrothed and married to Andronikos Belisariou. 