Mosaics decoration was first used many centuries ago. People from all over the world loved and decorated their floors, walls and places of worship with the small, wonderful, colored cut pieces. It was the Greeks, in the four centuries BC, who raised the pebble technique to an art form, with precise geometric patterns and detailed scenes of people and animals. By 200 BC, specially manufactured pieces ("tesserae") were being used to give extra detail and range of color to the work. Using small tesserae, meant that mosaics could imitate paintings.