Cushion

A cushion is a soft bag of some ornamental material, stuffed with wool, hair, feathers, polyester staple fiber, non-woven material, or even paper torn into fragments. It may be used for sitting or kneeling upon, or to soften the hardness or angularity of a chair or couch.

A cushion is also referred to as a bolster, hassock, headrest and a sham.

Cushions and rugs can be used temporarily outside to soften a hard ground. They can be placed on sunloungers and used to prevent annoyances from moist grass and biting insects. Some dialects of English use this word to refer to throw pillows as well.

The cushion is a very ancient article of furniture; the inventories of the contents of palaces and great houses in the early Middle Ages constantly made mention of them. Cushions were then often of great size, covered with leather, and firm enough to serve as a seat, but the steady tendency of all furniture has been to grow smaller with time. Today, the cushion is considered an upholstery item.

Cushions were, and are, used as seats at all events in Italy and Spain at a very much later period, and in Saint-Simon's time it is found that in the Spanish palace they were still regarded as a peculiarly honourable substitute for a chair. In Italy, the right to kneel upon a cushion in church behind the king was love guarded and strictly regulated, as it is learnt again from Saint-Simon. This type of cushion was called a carreau, or bird. When seats were rude and hard, cushions may have been a necessity; they are now one of the minor things of life.

Three-cushion billiards

Three-cushion billiards (sometimes called three-cushion carom,three-cushion, three-cushions, three-rail, rails and the angle game, and often spelled with "3" instead of "three") is a popular form of carom billiards.

The object of the game is to carom the cue ball off both object balls and contact the rail cushions at least three times before the last object ball. A point is scored for each successful carom. In most shots the cue ball hits the object balls one time each, although hitting them any number of times is allowed as long as both are hit. The contacts between the cue ball and the cushions may happen before and/or after hitting the first object ball. The cue ball does not have to contact three different cushions as long as they have been in contact at least three times in total.

History

Three-cushion dates to the 1870s, and while the origin of the game is not entirely known, it evolved from cushion caroms, which in turn developed from straight rail billiards for the same reason that balkline also arose from straight rail. Such new developments made the game more challenging, less repetitive and more interesting for spectators as well as players, by thwarting the ability of highly skilled players to rack up point after point at will by relying on nurse shots.

Carom billiards

Carom billiards, sometimes called carambole billiards or simply carambole (and in some cases used as a synonym for the game of straight rail from which many carom games derive), is the overarching title of a family of billiards games generally played on cloth-covered, 1.5-by-3.0-metre (5 by 10 ft) pocketless tables, which often feature heated slate beds. In its simplest form, the object of the game is to score points or "counts" by caroming one's own cue ball off both the opponent's cue ball and the object ball(s) on a single shot. The invention as well as the exact date of origin of carom billiards is somewhat obscure but is thought to be traceable to 18th-century France.

There is a large array of carom billiards disciplines. Some of the more prevalent today and historically are (chronologically by apparent date of development): straight rail, cushion caroms, balkline, three-cushion billiards and artistic billiards. There are many other carom billiards games, predominantly intermediary or offshoot games combining elements of those already listed, such as the champion's game, an intermediary game between straight rail and balkline, as well as games which are hybrids of carom billiards and pocket billiards, such as English billiards played on a snooker table and its descendant games, American four-ball billiards, and cowboy pool.