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Carom billiards, also called French billiards and sometimes carambole billiards, is the overarching title of a family of cue sports generally played on cloth-covered, . In its simplest form, the object of the game is to score or "counts" by one's own off both the opponent's cue ball and the 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, one-cushion, balkline, three-cushion and artistic billiards.
Carom billiards is popular in Europe, particularly France, where it originated. It is also popular in Asian countries, including Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, and Vietnam, but is now considered obscure in North America, having been supplanted by pool in popularity. The Union Mondiale de Billard (UMB) is the highest international governing body of competitive carom billiards.
In modern French, the word carambolage means 'successive collision', currently used mainly in reference to or shots in billiards, and to multiple-vehicle car crashes.
Most cloth made for carom billiard tables is a type of baize that is typically dyed green and is made from 100% worsted wool with no nap, which provides a very fast surface allowing the balls to travel with little resistance across the table .
The slate bed of a carom billiard table is often heated to about 5 °C (9 °F) above room temperature, which helps to keep moisture out of the cloth to aid the balls rolling and rebounding in a consistent manner, and generally makes a table play faster. An electrically heated table is required under international tournament rules 'in order to ensure the best possible rolling', although temperatures are not specified. It is an especially important requirement for the games of three-cushion billiards and artistic billiards, and even local billiard halls often have this feature in countries where carom games are popular. Queen Victoria (1819–1901) had a billiard table that was heated using zinc tubes, although the aim at that time was chiefly to keep the then-used ivory balls from warping. The first use of electric heating was for an 18.2 balkline tournament held in December 1927 between Welker Cochran and Jacob Schaefer Jr. The New York Times announced it with fanfare: "For the first time in the history of world's championship balkline billiards a heated table will be used ..."
Billiard balls have been made from many different materials throughout the history of the game, including clay, wood, ivory, plastics (including early formulations of celluloid, Bakelite, and crystalate, and more modern phenolic resin, polyester and Acrylate polymer), and even steel. The dominant material from 1627 until the early- to mid-20th century was ivory. The quest for an alternative to ivory was primarily driven by economic considerations and concerns for the safety of elephant hunters, rather than environmental or animal-welfare issues. The impetus for this search was, in part, the announcement by New York billiard table manufacturer Brunswick-Balke-Collender offering a $10,000 prize for the development of a substitute material. The initial successful alternative came in the form of celluloid, invented by John Wesley Hyatt in 1868. However, while celluloid was a viable substitute, it proved to be volatile and highly flammable, with instances of explosions occurring during its manufacturing process.
At straight rail's inception there was no restriction on the manner of scoring. However, the technique of crotching, or freezing two balls into the corner where the rails meet—the crotch—vastly increasing counts, resulted in an 1862 rule which allowed only three counts before at least one ball had to be driven away. Techniques continued to develop which increased counts greatly despite the crotching prohibition, especially the development of a variety of "" techniques. The most important of these, the , involves the progressive nudging of the object balls down a rail, ideally moving them only a small amount on each count, keeping them close together and positioned at the end of each stroke in the same or near the same configuration such that the nurse can be replicated again and again.
Straight rail is still popular in Europe, where it is considered a fine practice game for both balkline and three-cushion billiards. Additionally, Europe hosts professional competitions known as pentathlons in which straight rail is featured as one of five billiards disciplines at which players compete, the other four being 47.1 balkline, cushion caroms, 71.2 balkline, and three-cushion billiards.
Straight rail was played professionally in the United States from 1873 to 1879, but is uncommon there today.
Balkline succeeded the champion's game, adding more rules to curb nursing techniques. In the balkline games, the entire table is divided into rectangular balk spaces, by drawing pairs of balklines lengthwise and widthwise across the table parallel from each rail. This divides the table into nine rectangular balkspaces. Such balk spaces define areas of the in which a player may only score up to a threshold number of points while the are within that region. (1998). 9780717201310, Grolier Incorporated. ISBN 9780717201310 Additionally, rectangles are drawn where each balkline meets a rail, called anchor spaces, which developed to stop a number of nursing techniques that exploited the fact that if the object balls straddled a balkline, no count limit was in place.
For the most part, the differences between one balkline game to another is defined by two measures: the spacing of the balklines and the number of points that are allowed in each balk space before at least one ball must leave the region. Generally, balkline games and their particular restrictions are given numerical names indicating both of these characteristics; the first number indicated either inches or centimeters depending on the game, and the second, after a dot or a slash, indicates the count restriction in balk spaces, which is always either one or two. For example, in 18.2 balkline, one of the more prominent balkline games and of US origin, the name indicates that balklines are drawn distant from each rail, and only two counts are allowed in a balk space before a ball must leave. By contrast, in 71.2 balkline, of French invention, lines are drawn distant from each rail, also with a two-count restriction for balk spaces.
In its various incarnations, balkline was the predominant carom discipline from 1883 to the 1930s, when it was overtaken by three-cushion billiards and pool. Balkline is still popular in Europe and the Far East.
Three-cushion is a very difficult game. Averaging one point per is professional-level play, and averaging 1.5 to 2 is world-class play.
Wayman C. McCreery of St. Louis, Missouri, is credited with popularizing the game in the 1870s. At least one publication categorically states he invented the game as well. The first three-cushion billiards tournament took place 14–31 January 1878, in St. Louis, with McCreery a participant and Leon Magnus the winner. The high run for the tournament was just 6 points, and the high average a 0.75. The game was infrequently played, with many top carom players of the era voicing their dislike of it, until the 1907 introduction of the Lambert Trophy. By 1924, three-cushion had become so popular that two giants in other billiard disciplines agreed to take up the game especially for a challenge match. On 22 September 1924, Willie Hoppe, the world's balkline champion (who later took up three-cushion with a passion), and Ralph Greenleaf, the world's straight pool title holder, played a well advertised, multi-day, to 600 . Hoppe was the eventual winner with a final score in of 600–527.
Three-cushion billiards retains great popularity in parts of Europe, Asia, and Latin America, and is the most popular carom billiards game played in the US today. UMB, as the governing body of the sport, had been staging world three-cushion championships since the late 1920s.
Each shot in an artistic billiards match is played from a well-defined position (in some venues within an exacting two millimeter tolerance), and each shot must unfold in an established manner. Players are allowed three attempts at each shot. In general, the shots making up the game, even 4-point shots, require a high degree of skill, devoted practice and specialized knowledge to perform.Martin Škrášek (2000). What's Artistic Billiard? . Retrieved 30 November 2006
World title competition first started in 1986 and required the use of ivory balls. However, this requirement was dropped in 1990. The highest score ever achieved in competition overall is 427 set by Walter Bax on 12 March 2006, at a competition held in Deurne, Belgium, beating his own previous record of 425. The game is played predominantly in western Europe, especially in France, Belgium and the Netherlands.
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