The material used to make this piece, whilst being one of the ‘Devonshire marbles’, is in fact a limestone – unusually it takes a high polish which has led to it being described as such. Use of it came to prominence in the nineteenth century as it stood up to the rich colours and figuration of its Continental cousins and hence was perfect for decorative architectural features. Typically it is grey in colour with red haematite, pink and white calcite veins, often with an abundance of brachiopod, crinoid and coral fossils that lived in the sea some 350 million years ago, but sometimes slabs were quarried with a more decidedly pink and red colour palette as per this example.