Be a Master of Craps – Tips and Techniques: The History of Craps

[ English ]

Be brilliant, play smart, and master craps the proper way!

Games that use dice and the dice themselves date back to the Crusades, but modern craps is only about a century old. Modern craps evolved from the ancient Anglo game referred to as Hazard. Nobody knows for certain the ancestry of the game, however Hazard is believed to have been created by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, in the 12th century. It is supposed that Sir William’s soldiers gambled on Hazard during a siege on the citadel Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was acquired from the fortress’s name.

Early French settlers imported the game Hazard to Acadia. In the 1700s, when driven away by the British, the French headed south and found safety in the south of Louisiana where they a while later became known as Cajuns. When they left Acadia, they took their best-loved game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns streamlined the game and made it fair mathematically. It is believed that the Cajuns altered the title to craps, which is derived from the term for the non-winning toss of 2 in the game of Hazard, referred to as "crabs."

From Louisiana, the game extended to the Mississippi barges and throughout the country. Many consider the dice builder John H. Winn as the founder of modern craps. In 1907, Winn assembled the current craps setup. He created the Do not Pass line so players can bet on the dice to lose. At another time, he developed the spots for Place wagers and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.

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