The Marbled Beauty is a moth

Moth

A moth is an insect closely related to the butterfly, both being of the order Lepidoptera. Moths form the majority of this order; there are thought to be 150,000 to 250,000 different species of moth , with thousands of species yet to be described...

 of the family Noctuidae

Noctuidae

The Noctuidae or owlet moths are a family of robustly-built moths that includes more than 35,000 known species out of possibly 100,000 total, in more than 4,200 genera. They constitute the largest family in the Lepidoptera....

. It is an abundant species throughout most of Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, probably the commonest lichenivorous moth of the region.
This is quite a small species with a wingspan

Wingspan

The wingspan of an airplane or a bird, is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777 has a wingspan of about ; and a Wandering Albatross caught in 1965 had a wingspan of , the official record for a living bird.The term wingspan, more technically extent, is...

 of 22-30 mm. The forewings are white with dark grey cryptic markings, giving excellent camouflage against the lichen

Lichen

Lichens are composite organisms consisting of a symbiotic organism composed of a fungus with a photosynthetic partner , usually either a green alga or cyanobacterium...

s on which the eggs

Egg (biology)

An egg is an organic vessel in which an embryo first begins to develop. In most birds, reptiles, insects, molluscs, fish, and monotremes, an egg is the zygote, resulting from fertilization of the ovum, which is expelled from the body and permitted to develop outside the body until the developing...

 are laid. The intensity of the markings vary considerably, with darker individuals predominating in urban areas, an example of industrial melanism

Melanism

Melanism is an undue development of dark-colored pigment in the skin or its appendages, and the opposite of albinism. It is also the medical term for black jaundice.The word is deduced from the , meaning black pigment....

. A significant proportion of individuals also have orange or yellow markings. The hindwings are whitish with a broad grey band at the margin. The adults fly at night in July and August and are attracted to light.

The larva

Larva

A larva is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle...

 is bluish-grey with orange markings along the back. It feeds exclusively on lichens such as Lecidea

Lecidea

Lecidea is a lichenized genus of fungi within the Lecideaceae family. According to the Dictionary of the Fungi , the widespread genus contains an estimated 427 species....

and Xanthoria

Xanthoria

Xanthoria is a genus of lichenized fungi in the family Teloschistaceae.-External links:*...

. This species overwinters as a larva.