Category:Marble

Marble is a type of rock.

Did you know?


 * When polished, marble, like many other rocks, comes in many different colors and patterns.

Mar"ble, n. Etym: [OE. marbel, marbre, F. marbre, L. marmor, fr. Gr. Marmoreal.]

1. A massive, compact limestone; a variety of calcite, capable of being polished and used for architectural and ornamental purposes. The color varies from white to black, being sometimes yellow, red, and green, and frequently beautifully veined or clouded. The name is also given to other rocks of like use and appearance, as serpentine or verd antique marble, and less properly to polished porphyry, granite, etc.

Note: Breccia marble consists of limestone fragments cemented together. -- Ruin marble, when polished, shows forms resembling ruins, due to disseminated iron oxide. -- Shell marble contains fossil shells. -- Statuary marble is a pure, white, fine-grained kind, including Parian (from Paros) and Carrara marble. If coarsely granular it is called saccharoidal.

2. A thing made of, or resembling, marble, as a work of art, or record, in marble; or, in the plural, a collection of such works; as, the Arundel or Arundelian marbles; the Elgin marbles.

3. A little ball of marble, or of some other hard substance, used as a plaything by children; or, in the plural, a child's game played with marbles.

Note: Marble is also much used in self-explaining compounds; when used figuratively in compounds it commonly means, hard, cold, destitute of compassion or feeling; as, marble-breasted, marble- faced, marble-hearted.

marble Mar"ble, a.

1. Made of, or resembling, marble; as, a marble mantel; marble paper.

2. Cold; hard; unfeeling; as, a marble breast or heart.

marble Mar"ble, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Marbled; p. pr. & vb. n. Marbling.] Etym: [Cf. F. marbrer. See Marble, n.]

Defn: To stain or vein like marble; to variegate in color; as, to marble the edges of a book, or the surface of paper.

-

---excerpt from the Illustrated Bible Dictionary

Marble - As a mineral, consists of carbonate of lime, its texture varying from the highly crystalline to the compact. In Esther 1:6 there are four Hebrew words which are rendered marble: (1.) Shesh, "pillars of marble." But this word probably designates dark-blue limestone rather than marble. (2.) Dar some regard as Parian marble. It is here rendered "white marble." But nothing is certainly known of it. (3.) Bahat, "red marble," probably the verd-antique or half-porphyry of Egypt. (4.) Sohareth, "black marble," probably some spotted variety of marble. "The marble pillars and tesserae of various colors of the palace at Susa came doubtless from Persia itself, where marble of various colors is found, especially in the province of Hamadan Susiana." The marble of Solomon's architectural works may have been limestone from near Jerusalem, or from Lebanon, or possibly white marble from Arabia. Herod employed Parian marble in the temple, and marble columns still exist in great abundance at Jerusalem.