Marbling of Skin:
The superficial veins especially over the roots of the limb, thighs, sides of the abdomen, shoulders, chest and neck are stained
greenish-brown or purplish-red depending on the total amount of sulphhaemoglobin formation within
the affected vessels (linear branching pattern) due to the haemolysis of red cells, which stains the wall of the vessel and infiltrates into the tissue, giving a marbled appearance (red, then greenish pattern in skin resembling the branches of a tree)
This starts in 24 hours, but is prominent in 36 to 48 hours. The clotted blood becomes fluid, and as such, the position of the postmortem staining is altered,
and the fluid blood collects in the serous cavities.
Putrefactive effusion of foul-smelling bloodstained
fluid into the pleural cavities usually starts at about the time when the skin becomes macerated.
Such effusions usually do not exceed 60 to 100 ml. unless
death resulted from drowning, when several hundred ml. of drowning medium which oozed out through
the lungs and visceral pleura, may be present in the thoracic cavities. The reddish-green colour of the skin may become dark-green or almost black in 3 to 4 days.
Internal:
The earliest internal change is a
reddish-brown discolouration of the inner surfaces of the vessels, especially of the aorta.
Internally, decomposition proceeds more slowly than the surface.
The same changes of colour are seen in the viscera, but the colour varies from dark-red to black, rather than green. With this colour change, the viscera become softer and greasy to touch. Finally, they breakdown into a soft disintegrating mass