billiard

/ˈbɪlɪəd/

Etymology

From French billard with the insertion of the second i and orthographic representation of the French palatalized /j/ sound, originally referring to the wooden cue stick, diminutive of Old French bille (“log, tree trunk”), from Vulgar Latin *bilia, probably of Gaulish origin (compare Old Irish bile (“large tree, tree trunk”)), from Proto-Celtic *belyos (“tree”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰolh₃yos (“leaf”), from *bʰleh₃- (“blossom, flower”).

noun

  1. A shot in billiards or snooker in which the cue ball strikes two other balls; a carom.
  2. Pertaining to the game of billiards.“a billiard table; a billiard ball”
  3. A dynamical system in which a particle alternates between motion in a straight line and specular reflections from a boundary.

num

  1. 10¹⁵, a thousand billion (long scale) or a million milliard.