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Be a Master of Craps – Tricks and Plans: The Background of Craps

Be brilliant, play clever, and discover how to play craps the proper way!

Games that use dice and the dice themselves date all the way back to the Middle Eastern Crusades, but modern craps is just about one hundred years old. Modern craps evolved from the ancient English game called Hazard. Nobody absolutely knows the birth of the game, although Hazard is believed to have been made up by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, around the 12th century. It’s presumed that Sir William’s soldiers bet on Hazard amid a siege on the castle Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was derived from the castle’s name.

Early French colonists imported the game Hazard to Nova Scotia. In the 18th century, when displaced by the English, the French relocated south and settled in the south of Louisiana where they eventually became Cajuns. When they left Acadia, they brought their preferred game, Hazard, with them. The Cajuns streamlined the game and made it more mathematically fair. It’s believed that the Cajuns changed the title to craps, which was acquired from the name of the bad luck toss of two in the game of Hazard, referred to as "crabs."

From Louisiana, the game moved to the Mississippi riverboats and across the nation. A great many think the dice maker John H. Winn as the founder of modern craps. In the early 1900s, Winn assembled the modern craps setup. He put in place the Don’t Pass line so players could bet on the dice to lose. At another time, he invented the spots for Place wagers and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.

Posted in Craps.


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