light Italian marble
A marble pattern characterized by a network of
fine veins or lines. The usual marble of this
pattern consists of four colors, each successive
color requiring more gall and water than the
preceding, so that each will spread into large
spots in such a manner as to drive the other
colors into veins. When the different colors and
gall water have been properly adjusted to each
other and dropped on the surface of the size,
clear gall water, of an even stronger
concentration than any contained in the colors, is
sprinkled evenly over the entire surface; this
drives the colors into the fine hair veins for
which this marble is noted. Light Italian is
closely identified with the country from which it
derives its name, being found often as endpapers
in Italian books of the late 18th and 19th
centuries, and occasionally as cover papers. The
size for this marble is usually a mixture of gun
tragacanth and flea seed. (217 )
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