The trade is a mess because people sell whatever they want under the word “Venetian.” These are the words we use here. Wrong uses are marked.
Venetian plaster
English umbrella for Italian polished lime finishes, especially grassello / stucco veneziano. Not a single recipe. Not a paint.
Wrong: any shiny paste from a big-box aisle. If the binder is acrylic, say acrylic. Do not say Venetian plaster and stop.
Grassello di calce / Grasello
Aged lime putty (“fat lime”). Also the ultra-fine, high-polish finish made from that putty and very fine marble. Thin coats, burnished. Interior workhorse of “true” Venetian plaster.
Marmorino
“Little marble.” Lime putty + marble aggregate. More body than grasello. Satin to stone. Interior and often exterior. Fine, medium, and coarse are different products.
Stucco veneziano
The Italian name for the polished Venetian finish. Prefer this or grassello over the English marketing term when you are writing a spec.
Stucco lustro / lucido
A polish, not a brand. High-sheen burnished lime.
Travertino
Coarser lime plaster worked to an open, pitted, travertine-like surface. Different grain and different trowel action than marmorino.
Intonaco
A plaster coat. In fresco, the final painting coat. Not a synonym for Venetian plaster.
Intonachino / tonachino
Sanded lime stucco, often rustic, often exterior. Not a polished finish.
Arriccio
The coarser build coat under a fine finish.
Cocciopesto
Crushed terracotta in lime. Historic Venetian and Roman base. Gives some hydraulic character in damp work.
Lime paint / pittura a calce
A mineral paint of lime and pigment. A paint, not a plaster. Still lime. Still not latex.
Moroccan lime plaster, compressed and treated with black olive soap. The soap and lime make calcium stearate. That is a different tradition from Venetian plaster. Full page: tadelakt plaster.
Scagliola
Gypsum, glue, and pigment, worked to imitate marble, often inlaid or carved. Not lime Venetian plaster.
Slaking
Adding water to quicklime to make putty. Hot, dangerous if you do it yourself. Not “adding water to a bag of joint compound.”
Carbonation
The cure: Ca(OH)2 + CO2 → CaCO3. Not drying. Needs air.
Aerial lime
Lime that sets by carbonation in air. Will not set underwater.
Hydraulic lime
Lime with compounds that set with water, less dependent on air. Different material, different spec.
Burnishing
Compressing the surface with a steel trowel (or stone, in tadelakt) to close and polish it. Not the same as waxing.
Wax
A finish coat, often beeswax, for sheen and some protection. Not waterproofing. Not a substitute for the right plaster in a wet room.
Quartz primer / fondo
A gritted primer so lime has tooth on drywall or paint. Lime does not magically stick to everything.
Acrylic “Venetian plaster”
A polymer decorative coating that can be burnished. Useful when specified as acrylic. It is not Italian lime, does not carbonate to stone, and should not be used to bid a lime spec.