a soft sandstone used for scrubbing the decks of a ship
scrub with a holystone; "holystone the ship's deck"
soft white sandstone used for cleaning wooden decks by scouring
A chunk of sandstone used to scrub the decks. The name comes from both the kneeling position sailors adopt to scrub the deck (reminiscent of genuflection for prayer), and the stone itself (which resembled a Bible in shape and size).
bars of sandstone used to scrub a ship's decking. To scrub so was " holystoning."
Holystone is a soft and brittle sandstone that was formerly used for scouring and whitening the wooden decks of ships. It was used in the British and American Navy for scrubbing the decks of sailing ships.