The word "carom" means any strike and bounce off something. It started being used to describe the pocketless billiard games in the 1860s. It is a shortening of the word "carambola", used in Spanish and Portuguese and spelled "carambole" in French. Carambola was earlier used to describe just the red ball used in billiards games, but later was given to the game itself. Some people who study word origins suggest that "carambola" was originally the name of a yellow-to-orange colored, tropical Asian fruit, known in Portuguese as a "carambola". This was taken from an earlier word, "karambal", from the Marathi language of India, also known as starfruit. The accuracy of the fruit origin has been questioned. It has been said to be just a legend, because the fruit does not look very similar to the big red ball that is used in carom games, and there is no direct proof for the fruit explanation.