Marble

Noun

 * 1)  A rock of crystalline limestone.
 * 2) * 1751, Thomas Morell (librettist), Jephtha:
 * Open thy marble jaws, O tomb / And hide me, earth, in thy dark womb.
 * 1)  A small spherical ball of rock, glass, ceramic or metal used in children's games.

Quotations

 * 1871, Marion Harland, Common sense in the household: a manual of practical housewifery, page 127:
 * Veal Marble. Boil a beef-tongue the day before it is to be used, and a like number of pounds of lean veal; [...]

Derived terms

 * lose one's marbles
 * Marble Bar
 * marble beef


 * marble cake
 * marbles
 * Pentelic marble
 * Picasso marble

Verb

 * 1)  To cause (something to have) the streaked or swirled appearance of certain types of marble, for example by mixing viscous ingredients incompletely, or by applying paint or other colorants unevenly.
 * 2) * 1774, William Hutchinson, An excursion to the lakes in Westmoreland and Cumberland, August, 1773, page 29:
 * The small clouds which chequered the sky, as they passed along, spread their flitting shadows on the distant mountains, and seemed to marble them; a beauty which I do not recollect has struck any painter.
 * 1) * 1899, Thirteenth Annual Report of the Commissioner of Labor, volume 1, page 106:
 * In the operation of marbling the edges of the books, [...]
 * 1)  To have the streaked or swirled appearance of certain types of marble, for example due to the incomplete mixing of viscous ingredients, or the uneven application of paint or other colorants.
 * 2) * 2007, Alicia Grosso, The Everything Soapmaking Book: Recipes and Techniques, page 125:
 * Scent the entire batch and then color half with the blue colorant. Pour both parts back into your soap pot. Do not stir. Pour in a circular motion into a block mold. The pouring action will cause the soap to marble.
 * 1)  To interlace (meat, usually beef, pork, or lamb) (with fat); to cause (meat) to be interlaced (with fat).
 * 2) * 1848, Samuel D. Martin, in a letter to the Albany Cultivator, quoted in the Fourteenth Annual Report of the Ohio State Board of Agriculture (for the year 1859; published 1860), page 157:
 * Their flesh is soft (tender), and they throw a portion of their fat among the lean so as to marble it. The beef is of a better quality and they take on fat much easier.
 * 1) * 1904, Annual Report of the Wisconsin State Board of Agriculture for the year 1903, page 309:
 * The Merino sheep is likely to put his weight largely into tallow around the stomach, intestines and on his kidneys, instead of mixing fairly with the meat, instead of marbling the meat.
 * 1) * 2004, Mary Ellen Snodgrass, Encyclopedia of kitchen history, page 684:
 * Either by forcing the lardoon out with a plunger, by pushing it with a knife point, or by trailing it behind the needle, the cook artificially marbles the meat. For French cooks intent on larding, traditionally, the choice fat was the lard gras (pork fat).
 * 1)  To have its meat become interlaced with fat.
 * 2) * 1999, Kathleen Jo Ryan, Deep in the heart of Texas: Texas ranchers in their own words, page 99:
 * We've gone mostly to black bulls — Angus bulls because today the packers like black cattle. They seem to marble better.
 * 1)  To become interlaced with fat.

Quotations

 * 1972, Sondra Gotlieb, The Gourmet’s Canada, page 129:
 * The exercising of the cattle causes the fat to marble right through the animal — and much of the flavour is found in the fat.
 * 1993, Susan Napier, Winter of Dreams, page 52:
 * Was he the reason for the bitterness that seemed to marble her character?
 * Was he the reason for the bitterness that seemed to marble her character?

Synonyms

 * marbleize, marbelize

Derived terms

 * marbling

Adjectives for Marble
mottled; blended; breathing; variegated; wrought; remarkable; chill; polished; synthetic; lusterless; ponderous; snowy; chiseled ; cold; imitation.

Thesaurus
Dalmatian, adamant, agate, alabaster, antigorite, argent, argentine, ball, band, bar, baseball bat, bat, battledore, bauble, bespangle, bespeckle, bespot, billiard table, blocks, blotch, bone, bony, bowling alley, bowling green, brick, bronze, butterfly, candy cane, canescent, cast, cement, cemental, chalky, chameleon, check, checker, checkerboard, cheetah, chessboard, chrysotile, club, cockhorse, concrete, confetti, corneous, crazy quilt, cretaceous, cricket bat, cue, dapple, dense, diamond, diamondlike, doll, doll carriage, dot, dure, firedog, flake, flat, fleck, fleecy-white, flint, flintlike, flinty, freckle, frosted, frosty, gewgaw, gimcrack, glass, golf club, granite, granitelike, granitic, grizzled, grizzly, hard, hard as nails, hardhearted, harlequin, heart of oak, hoar, hoary, hobbyhorse, horny, ice, iris, iron, iron-hard, ironlike, ivory, jack-in-the-box, jacks, jackstones, jackstraws, jaguar, kickshaw, knickknack, lactescent, lapideous, leopard, level, lily-white, lithoid, lithoidal, mackerel, mackerel sky, maculate, mahogany, marbled paper, marbleize, marblelike, marionette, marmoreal, mig, milky, mobile, moire, mother-of-pearl, motley, mottle, nacre, nails, niveous, oak, obdurate, ocelot, opal, ophite, osseous, paper doll, patchwork quilt, peacock, pepper, pick-up sticks, pinwheel, plane, platinum, plaything, polychrome, polychromize, puppet, pure white, racket, rag doll, rainbow, resistant, resistive, rock, rocking horse, rocklike, rocky, satin, sculpture, serpentine, serpentine marble, shot silk, silk, silver, silvered, silvery, slide, smooth, snow-white, snowy, solid, spangle, speck, speckle, spectrum, splotch, sport, spot, sprinkle, stabile, statue, steel, steelie, steellike, steely, stigmatize, stipple, stone, stonelike, stony, streak, striate, stripe, stud, swan-white, tattoo, taw, teetotum, tennis court, terra cotta, tessellate, top, tortoise shell, tough, toy, toy soldier, trinket, variegate, vein, velvet, whim-wham, white, white as snow, zebra

Etymology
From and  marbre:, from  marmor:, from  μάρμαρος:, perhaps related to μαρμάρεος:. Much of the early classical marble came from the 'Marmaris' sea above the Aegean. The forms from French replaced marma:, which had previously been borrowed from Latin.

Noun

 * Arabic: رخام
 * Armenian:
 * Catalan:
 * Chinese:
 * Mandarin:
 * Czech:
 * Danish:
 * Dutch:
 * Finnish:
 * French:
 * German:
 * Greek: μάρμαρο
 * Icelandic: marmari
 * Italian:
 * Japanese: 大理石 (dairiseki)
 * Korean: 대리석 (daeriseok)


 * Kurdish: mermer ,
 * Latin:
 * Macedonian:
 * Norwegian:
 * Persian:
 * Polish:
 * Portuguese:
 * Romanian:
 * Russian:
 * Serbo-Croatian:
 * Cyrillic: мермер, мрамор
 * Roman: mermer, mramor
 * Spanish:
 * Swedish:
 * Turkish:
 * Volapük: maboin


 * Czech: kulička, kuličky
 * Dutch:
 * Finnish: marmorikuula
 * French:
 * German:
 * Italian: ,
 * Japanese: ビー玉 (bīdama)
 * Korean: 구슬 (guseul)
 * Kurdish: tebel, xar ,
 * Macedonian: џамлија
 * Norwegian:
 * Polish: ,
 * Portuguese: bola de gude, berlinde


 * Serbo-Croatian:
 * Cyrillic: кликер
 * Roman: kliker
 * Spanish: canica, balita , bola  , bola de cristal  , bola de vidrio  , boliche   , bolincha  , bolindre  , bolita  , cachina  , chibola  , mable  , maule  , metra  , picha
 * Swedish:
 * Turkish: misket, bilye
 * Volapük: glöpil

Verb

 * Finnish: marmoroida
 * French:


 * German:

Related terms

 * marmoreal

Anagrams

 * ambler, blamer, ramble