Ottoman

   The ottoman is a stuffed or cushioned footstool, sometimes called a hassock. Also called an ottoman is a backless couch, which in America never attained the popularity of the footstool.

   The namesake that people have been resting their feet on (the footstool) or their entire bodies (the couch) came from Osman I (1288—1320). Europeans sometimes corrupted the name to Othman or Ottoman, the once-mighty ruler of the Turks and the founder of the Ottoman Empire. His descendants ruled the great empire for more than six centuries, until its dissolution in 1919. The Ottoman Empire ruled from its capital Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) vast land areas comprising in south stern Asia, northeastern Africa, and much of southeastern Europe. Toward the end of the eighteenth century, there was a surge of interest in Oriental splendors—carpets, pillows, furniture. Shrewd merchants promoted the furniture to feed the imagination of the Eastern potentates. And so backless sofas came into demand, as did the cushioned footstool.

   Ottoman takes its name from the feminine form of the French ottomane, which in turn comes from the Arabic word for Turkish Othmani.