cushion
UK/ˈkʊʃən/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
British/ˈkɵʃən/
cushion noun: a soft mass of material stuffed into a cloth bag, used for comfort or support.
Noun
cushion (countable and uncountable, plural cushions)
- A soft mass of material stuffed into a cloth bag, used for comfort or support.
- “There the cause of death was soon ascertained ; the victim of this daring outrage had been stabbed to death from ear to ear with a long, sharp instrument, in shape like an antique stiletto, which […] was subsequently found under the cushions of the hansom.[…]”1904–1905, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], “The Tremarn Case”, in The Case of Miss Elliott, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1905, →OCLC; republished as popular edition, London: Greening &...
- There were many wooden chairs for the bulk of his visitors, and two wicker armchairs with red cloth cushions for superior people. From the packing-cases had emerged some Indian clubs,[…], and all these articles[…] made a scattered and untidy decoration that Mrs. Clough assiduously dusted and...1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC
- A throw pillow.
- A thin, flat pad used on hard chairs and sometimes toilet seats.
- A pad on which gilders cut gold leaf.
- A mass of steam in the end of the cylinder of a steam engine to receive the impact of the piston.
- The lip around a table in cue sports which absorbs some of the impact of the billiard balls and bounces them back.
- The pillow used in making bone lace.
- An engraver's pad.
- The rubber of an electrical machine.
- A pad supporting a woman's hair.
- a sufficient quantity of an intangible object (like points or minutes) to allow for some of those points, for example, to be lost without hurting one's chances for successfully completing an objective.
- Wisla made a bright start to the second half and Fulham keeper Mark Schwarzer was twice called into action, first saving Gervasio Nunez's deflected 20-yard effort and then smothering Gargula's free-kick.
But Fulham soon had the cushion of a third goal after more outstanding build-up play.2011 November 3, Arindam Rej, “Fulham 4-1 Wisla Krakow”, in BBC Sport - It will most likely not alter the destination of the league title, which still seems bound for City, who retain an 11-point cushion at the top2021 March 7, David Hytner, “Manchester United catch City cold as Fernandes and Shaw end winning run”, in The Guardian
- Money kept in reserve.
- The entry-level wages are abominable, still something like $15,000 a year. You can't possibly be a working class person and live on that in New York City. You need some kind of family "cushion." So what you'll find in publishing is middle class professionals, people who see material about working...1990 February 4, Pam Mitchell, Valerie Miller, “Skepticism, Steel Mills And Everyday Stories”, in Gay Community News, volume 17, number 29, page 8
- Interest coverage is important because it is an indicator of how much cushion a company has in making its interest payments.2007, Belverd Needles, Marian Powers, Financial Accounting: Media Enhanced, page 826
- Wisla made a bright start to the second half and Fulham keeper Mark Schwarzer was twice called into action, first saving Gervasio Nunez's deflected 20-yard effort and then smothering Gargula's free-kick.
- The dancer in the cushion dance who currently holds the cushion, or the dance itself.
- But of these kind of second Courses I am the onely Cook; though yet those ordinary practises of our Feasts, as choosing a King, throwing Dice, drinking Healths, trouling it Round, dancing the Cushion and the like, were not invented by the seven Wise Men but my Self, and that too for the common...1668, Desiderius Erasmus, translated by John Wilson, edited by Helen Mary Allen, The Praise of Folly, published 1913, page 35
- The young man advances to the fiddler, drops a penny in the pot, and gives it to one of his companions. Cushion then dances round the room, followed by the pot, and when they again reach the fiddler, the cushion says, in a sort of recitative, accompanied by the music, 'This dance it will no farther...1836, George Dubourg, The Violin, page 21
Verb
cushion (third-person singular simple present cushions, present participle cushioning, simple past and past participle cushioned)
- To furnish with cushions.
- to cushion a sofa
- To seat or place on, or as on a cushion.
- How many doughty monarchs, in later and more polite ages, would have slept in cottages, and have worked in falls, instead of inhabiting palaces, and being cushioned up in thrones, if this rule of government had continued in force ?1734, Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, A Dissertation on Parties
- To absorb or deaden the impact of.
- to cushion a blow
- […]the development of popular interest in Parliament made it less possible for the Privy Council in Dublin to cushion a bill which the Commons had presented to the Lord Lieutenant[…]1903, Edward Porritt, “Poynings' Law”, in The Unreformed House of Commons, volume II, page 429
- Synonyms:
- buffer
- To conceal or cover up, as under a cushion.
cushion meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
cushion in Hindi
- soft material in cloth bag
- तकिया takiyā, बालिश bāliś, मसनद masnad
cushion in Tamil
- soft material in cloth bag
- தலையணை talaiyaṇai, மெத்தை mettai
- absorbent or protective item
- மெத்தை mettai
- absorb impact
- தணி taṇi
cushion in Marathi
- गादी, कुशन
cushion in Urdu
- soft material in cloth bag
- تَکْیَہ takya, تَکِیَہ takiya, بالِش bāliś, مَسْنَد masnad
More languagesFewer languages
- cushion in Bengali
- কুশন kuśon, উপাধান upadhan, বালিশ baliś
- cushion in Telugu
- దిండు diṇḍu
- cushion in Malayalam
- കിടക്ക, തലയിണ, കുഷ്യൻ, ഇരിപ്പിടത്തിൽ ഉപയോഗിക്കുന്ന മെത്ത
- cushion in Kannada
- ಮೆತ್ತೆ mette
- cushion in Punjabi
- ਗੱਦੀ gaddī, سرہانا sirhāṇā, ਸਿੰਘਾਸਣ siṅghāsaṇ
- cushion in Odia
- କୁସନ୍
- cushion in Sanskrit
- परिस्तोम paristoma
- cushion in Nepali
- चकटी cakaṭī, तकिया takiyā
- cushion in Arabic
- وِسَادَة wisāda, وَسَادَة wasāda, وُسَادَة wusāda, نُمْرُقَة numruqa
- cushion in Malay
- kusyen
- cushion in Indonesian
- bantal
- cushion in Thai
- เบาะ bɔ̀, หมอน mɔ̌ɔn
- cushion in Vietnamese
- đệm, gối dựa, gối xếp
- cushion in Myanmar
- ကူရှင် kuhrang, ဖုံ hpum, အခု a.hku.
Examples of cushion in a sentence
- There were many wooden chairs for the bulk of his visitors, and two wicker armchairs with red cloth cushions for superior people.1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
- You need some kind of family "cushion." So what you'll find in publishing is middle class professionals, people who see material about working class people as "foreign."1990 February 4, Pam Mitchell, Valerie Miller, “Skepticism, Steel Mills And Everyday Stories”, in Gay Community News, volume 17, number 29...
- If one of the banks has a significant enough cushion of capital and a strong enough balance sheet, then it would not experience a bank run, and the domino effect in panel A would not have occurred.2013, Stijn Claessens, Kirsten Forbes, International Financial Contagion, page 85:
- Cushion then dances round the room, followed by the pot, and when they again reach the fiddler, the cushion says, in a sort of recitative, accompanied by the music, 'This dance it will no farther go.'1836, George Dubourg, The Violin, page 21:
Synonyms of cushion
Forms of cushion
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | cushions |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | cushions |
| present participle | cushioning |
| past participle | cushioned |
| past | cushioned |
Origin of cushion
From Middle English quysshyn, from later Old French coissin (modern coussin), from Vulgar Latin *coxīnus (“seat pad”), derived from Latin coxa (“hip, thigh”) (with the suffix possibly after Latin pulvīnus (“pillow”)), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *koḱs- (“joint, limb”).
Words formed from cushion
- air cushion
- air cushion vehicle
- air-cushion vehicle
- barbell cushion
- cushion-cosy
- cushion cosy
- cushion-dance
- cushion for the pushin'
- cushion gum
- cushionless
- cushionlike
- cushion plant
- cushion-smiter
- cushion spurge
- cushion star
- cushion tire
- cushion tyre
- cushiony
- financial cushion
- jump cushion
- jumping cushion
- king's cushion
- lady's cushion
- more cushion for the pushin'
- mother-in-law's cushion
- pin-cushion
- pincushion
- pin cushion
- safety cushion
- scatter cushion
- seat cushion
- speed cushion
- T-cushion
- thump-cushion
- whoopee cushion
- whoopie cushion
- cushion the blow
- recushion
Phrases with cushion
Words that rhyme with cushion
Questions about cushion
- What does cushion mean?
- Cushion means a soft mass of material stuffed into a cloth bag, used for comfort or support.
- What is cushion in Hindi?
- Cushion in Hindi is तकिया (takiyā), बालिश (bāliś), मसनद (masnad). See Cushion meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use cushion in a sentence?
- There were many wooden chairs for the bulk of his visitors, and two wicker armchairs with red cloth cushions for superior people.
- What part of speech is cushion?
- Cushion can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce cushion?
- Cushion is pronounced /ˈkʊʃən/ (UK).
- What is the plural of cushion?
- The plural of cushion is cushions.
Words near cushion in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: cushion (page history and authors); cushion (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cushion (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); سرہانا (Punjabi) (page history and authors); cushion (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); परिस्तोम (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); चकटी (Nepali) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-cushion.ogg.
Cite this entry: “cushion.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cushion. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.