How billiards and snooker came to be known
By Hafiz Marikar
Billiards has a long and rich history stretching from its inception
in the 15th century, to the wrapping of the body of Mary-Queen of Scots,
in her billiard table cover in 1586, through its many mentions in the
words of Shakespeare, including the famous line "let's to billiards" in
Antony and Cleopatra (1606-07), and through the many famous enthusiasts
of the sport: Mozart, Louis XIV of France, Marie Antoinette, Immanuel
Kant, Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln, Mark Twain, George Washington, French
president Jules Grévy, Charles Dickens, George Armstrong Custer,
Theodore Roosevelt, Lewis Carroll, W.C.Fields, Babe Ruth, Bob Hope,
Jackie Gleason, and many others.
The word "billiard" may have evolved from the French word billart or
billette, meaning "stick" in reference to the mace, an implement similar
to a golf club, which was the forerunner to the modern cue; the term's
origin may have also been from French bille, meaning "ball".The modern
term "cue sports" can be used to encompass the ancestral mace games, and
even the modern cueless variants, such as finger billiards, for
historical reasons. "Cue" itself came from queue, the French word for a
tail. This refers to the early practice of using the tail of the mace to
strike the ball when it lay against a rail cushion.
A recognizable form of billiards was played outdoors in the 1340s,
and was reminiscent of croquet. King Louis XI of France(1461-1483) had
the first known indoor billiard table. Louis XIV further refined and
popularized the game, and it swiftly spread amongst the French nobility.
While the game had long been played on the ground, this version appears
to have died out in the 17th century, in favour of croquet, golf and
bowling games, while table billiards had grown in popularity as an
indoor activity. Mary, Queen of Scots, claimed that her "table de
billiard" had been taken away by what would eventually become her
executioners (who covered her body with the table's cloth). In 1588, the
Duke of Norfolk, owned a "billyard bord coered with a greene cloth...
three billyard sticks and 11 balls of Ivery" Billiards grew to the
extent that by 1727, it was being played in almost every Paris cafe. In
England, the game was developing into a popular activity for members of
the gentry.
Cue sports (sometimes written cuesports) also known as billiard and
snooker is a wide variety of games of skill generally played with a cue
stick, which is used to strike the balls, moving around a cloth-covered
table bounded by rubber cushions.
Historically, the umbrella term was billiards. While that familiar
name is still employed by some as a generic label for all such games,
the word's usage has splintered into more exclusive competing meanings
in various parts of the world. For example, in British and Australia,
"billiards" usually refers exclusively to the game of English billiards,
while in America and Canada, it is sometimes used to refer to a
particular game or class of games, or to all cue games in general,
depending upon dialect and context.
There are three major subdivisions of the games within cue sports:
Snooker and English billiards, games played on a billiards table with
six pockets called a snooker table (which has dimensions just under 12ft
by 6ft) that are classified entirely separately from pool based on a
separate historical development, as well as a separate culture and
terminology that characterises their play.
More obscurely, there are games that make use of obstacles and
targets, and table-top games played with disks instead of balls.
A brief history of Billairds - The origins of several sports have
been lost in history while others have been surrounded by fantasy and
billiards is no exception. In the early 15th century, the gardens of the
rich and laned gentry throughout the world played host to a number of
lawn games. The game 'croquets' played in France being among them is
said to be the origin of billiards. Louis XI of France was given credit
for switching the game onto a table in the 15th century. Another tale,
says that Mary Queen of Scots and her "table de billard' was confiscated
before she was executed. Then we are told that they wrapped her headless
corpse in the billiard cloth.
History of Snooker in brief - The sport it is said really came of on
a wet day at Jubbulpore in India in 1875. The officers of the Devonshire
Regiment used to spend hours playing billiards while waiting for the
monsoon rains to abate. The men, understandably were often bored until a
young officer later Sir Neville Chamberlain began to experiment.
Different variations of billiards; were devised - games with name like
pyramids, life pool and black p. The new games proved popular and the
clever Chamberlain began to add various coloured balls until a native
but playable form of snooker was conceived. History says that the early
dorm of snooker included 15 reds but only one white, yellow, green pink
and black. A few years later the brown and blue were added, giving us
the same set-up as modern day snooker. In 1885, John Roberts then a top
billiards ace was introduced to Chamberlain who was in India. The game
was introduced to Britain by Roberts and the World plays it today.
Today snooker is the boom sport of the Whites, also it seem
tailor-made for television for one can see all the actions in a compact
space and these are vivid close-ups for star performers.
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