Be clever, play brilliant, and become versed in craps the proper way!
Games that use dice and the dice themselves date back to the Crusades, but modern craps is approximately one hundred years old. Modern craps come about from the ancient English game referred to as Hazard. No one knows for sure the beginnings of the game, but Hazard is said to have been discovered by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, sometime in the twelfth century. It’s presumed that Sir William’s knights wagered on Hazard during a siege on the fortification Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was derived from the fortification’s name.
Early French colonists brought the game Hazard to Acadia. In the 1700s, when driven away by the English, the French moved south and discovered sanctuary in southern Louisiana where they a while later became Cajuns. When they left Acadia, they took their best-loved game, Hazard, with them. The Cajuns modernized the game and made it more mathematically fair. It is said that the Cajuns altered the name to craps, which was gotten from the term for the losing throw of 2 in the game of Hazard, referred to as "crabs."
From Louisiana, the game extended to the Mississippi river boats and throughout the country. A few consider the dice maker John H. Winn as the creator of modern craps. In the early 1900s, Winn created the current craps setup. He appended the Do not Pass line so gamblers could bet on the dice to lose. Afterwords, he invented the boxes for Place bets and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.
