Grigio di Billiemi
Grigio di Billiemi or Billiemi marble is a natural stone and petrographically a brecciated limestone from Italy. It is mined at Monte Billiemi northwest of Palermo .
Condition and use
The color of the rock is dark gray, sometimes with pink spots. It can be polished to a high gloss. It was used extensively by Sicilian sculptors and stonemasons for architectural purposes, often for columns and other load-bearing parts of the building, as it could be extracted in large rough blocks. You can find it in many important secular and sacred buildings in Palermo, here also for paving the streets and in buildings. Application examples can be found on the Quattro Canti , Casa Professa or Porta Felice .
Today the Billiemi marble is used for tiles, stairs, bathrooms, fountains, etc.
history
Since 1190 the area belonged to the Archbishop of Palermo and between the 16th and 18th centuries it was sold to private owners for pasturing and cultivating myrtle . The quarries of Monte Billiemi were not mentioned in older documents. They were probably opened at the end of the 17th century, as can be seen from the first work in Billiemi marble in Palermo, such as the columns of the Jesuit monastery in Palermo and the adjacent Casa Professa (built 1591–1597) or the entrance portal of the courtyard of the palace of the Sicilian noble family Valguarnera-Gangi , which was built in 1603, can close. The oldest document that mentions the quarrying of the stone dates back to 1600. It concerns the execution of eight columns in Billiemi stone for the now defunct church of S. Lucia al Borgo extra moenia that of Pietro Serpotta was built on behalf of the Viceroy Maqueda.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Giuseppe Montana, Valentina Gagliardo Bruccia: I Marmi ed i Diaspri del Barocco siciliano . Flaccovio editore. Palermo 1998, p. 61, ISBN 88-7804-149-1