I think you can be pretty safe with 'lime', but it might depend just a little on the context (well, obviously). I can only speak for the UK, but while masonry was rendered with plaster as long as I have witnessed it - and probably still is - you'd only have to go back a generation or so to the time when interior walls were rendered with horse hair and lime. I believe it was not as strong as plaster, which is why you had dado rails and high skirting boards and such to stop the furniture from making big holes in it.
Be that as it may, lime was, and therefore can/could be, used in much the same way as plaster.
But it doesn't rhyme as well with alabaster.
http://www.oldhousestore.co.uk/produ...lo_LPLR0010001
er - or you might feel more at home with this one...
http://www.heritageconservation.net/...ir-plaster.htm