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Chair
A chair is a piece of furniture for sitting, consisting of a seat, a
back, and sometimes arm rests, commonly for use by one person. Chairs
also often have four legs to support the seat raised above the floor.
Without back and arm rests it is called a stool. A chair for more than
one person is a couch, sofa, settee, loveseat, recliner or bench. A
separate footrest for a chair is known as an ottoman, hassock or
pouffe. A chair mounted in a vehicle or in a theater is simply called
a seat. Chairs as furniture typically can be moved.
The back often does not extend all the way to the seat to allow for
ventilation. Likewise, the back and sometimes the seat are made of
porous materials or have holes drilled in them for decoration and
ventilation.
The back may extend above the height of the head. There may be
separate headrests. Headrests for seats in vehicles are important for
preventing whiplash injuries to the neck when the vehicle is involved
in a rear-end collision.
History
The chair is of extreme antiquity, although for many centuries and
indeed for thousands of years it was an article of state and dignity
rather than an article of ordinary use. "The chair" is still
extensively used as the emblem of authority in the House of Commons in
the United Kingdom and Canada, and in public meetings. It was not, in
fact, until the 16th century that it became common anywhere. The
chest, the bench and the stool were until then the ordinary seats of
everyday life, and the number of chairs which have survived from an
earlier date is exceedingly limited; most of such examples are of
ecclesiastical or seigneurial origin. Our knowledge of the chairs of
remote antiquity is derived almost entirely from monuments, sculpture
and paintings. A few actual examples exist in the British Museum, in
the Egyptian Museum at Cairo, and elsewhere.
In ancient Egypt chairs appear to have been of great richness and
splendor[citation needed]. Fashioned of ebony and ivory, or of carved
and gilded wood, they were covered with costly materials and supported
upon representations of the legs of beasts or the figures of captives.
The earliest known form of Greek chair, going back to five or six
centuries BCE, had a back but stood straight up, front and back.
During Tang dynasty (618 - 907 AD), a higher seat first started to
appear amongst the Chinese elite and their usage soon spread to all
levels of society. By the 12th century seating on the floor was rare
in China, unlike in other Asian countries where the custom continued,
and the chair, or more commonly the stool, was used in the vast
majority of houses throughout the country.
In Europe, it was owing in great measure to the Renaissance that the
chair ceased to be a privilege of state, and became a standard item of
furniture whoever could afford to buy it. Once the idea of privilege
faded the chair speedily came into general use. We find almost at once
that the chair began to change every few years to reflect the fashions
of the hour.
The 20th century saw an increasing use of technology in chair
construction with such things as all-metal folding chairs,
metal-legged chairs, the Slumber Chair, moulded plastic chairs and
ergonomic chairs. The recliner became a popular form, at least in part
due to radio and television, and later a two-part. The modern movement
of the 1960s produced new forms of chairs: the butterfly chair, bean
bags, and the egg-shaped pod chair. Technological advances led to
molded plywood and wood laminate chairs, as well as chairs made of
leather or polymers. Mechanical technology incorporated into the chair
enabled adjustable chairs, especially for office use. Motors embedded
in the chair resulted in massage chairs |