A repeating background of thick textured paper. Actually, it turned out to look like something between a paper and fabric.
Source V. Hartikainen
From a drawing in 'Gately's World's Progress', Charles Beale, 1886.
Source Firkin
A free seamless background image with a texture of dark red "canvas". It should look very nice on web sites.
Source V. Hartikainen
Drawn in Paint.net using the kaleidoscope plug-in and vectorised.
Source Firkin
Pixel by pixel, sharp and clean. Very light pattern with clear lines.
Source M.Ashok
From a drawing in 'At home', J. Sowerby, J. Crane and T. Frederick, 1881.
Source Firkin
Like the name says, light and gray, with some small dots and circles.
Source Brenda Lay
Prismatic Abstract Geometric Background 5 No Black
Source GDJ
A cute x, if you need that sort of thing.
Source Juan Scrocchi
A fun-looking elastoplast/band-aid pattern. A hint of orange tone in this one.
Source Josh Green
Looks like an old wall. I guess that’s it then?
Source Viahorizon
Same as the black version, but now in shades of gray. Very subtle and fine grained.
Source Atle Mo
Remixed from a PNG that was uploaded to Pixabay by k_jprather
Source Firkin
Remixed from a drawing in 'Line and form", Walter Crane, 1914.
Source Firkin
A light brushed aluminum pattern for your pleasure.
Source Tim Ward
Remixed from a drawing in 'Kulturgeschichte der Deutschen im Mittelalter' Franz von Loeher, 1891. The unit tile can be had by selecting the rectangle in Inkscape and using shift-alt-i
Source Firkin
Prismatic Geometric Tessellation Pattern 2 No Background
Source GDJ
Prismatic Polyskelion Pattern No Background
Source GDJ
Seamless , tileable CC-0 texture. Created by my own, feel free to use wherever you want!
Source Linolafett
To get the tile this is based on select the rectangle in Inkscape and use shift+alt+i.
Source Firkin
White fabric looking texture with some nice random wave features.
Source Hendrik Lammers
Prismatic Hypnotic Pattern 2 No Background
Source GDJ
This is so subtle I hope you can see it! Tweak at will.
Source Alexandre Naud