Master Craps – Tips and Plans: The Past of Craps

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Games that use dice and the dice themselves date back to the Middle Eastern Crusades, but current craps is just about one hundred years old. Current craps evolved from the 12th Century Anglo game called Hazard. Nobody absolutely knows the beginnings of the game, although Hazard is believed to have been invented by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, in the 12th century. It’s theorized that Sir William’s paladins bet on Hazard through a blockade on the citadel Hazarth in 1125 AD. The title Hazard was gotten from the fortress’s name.

Early French colonists imported the game Hazard to Nova Scotia. In the 1700s, when displaced by the British, the French headed south and found safety in southern Louisiana where they eventually became Cajuns. When they fled Acadia, they took their favored game, Hazard, with them. The Cajuns streamlined the game and made it fair mathematically. It is believed that the Cajuns altered the title to craps, which is gotten from the term for the losing throw of snake-eyes in the game of Hazard, recognized as "crabs."

From Louisiana, the game extended to the Mississippi scows and throughout the nation. Most acknowledge the dice maker John H. Winn as the founder of modern craps. In the early 1900s, Winn designed the current craps setup. He added the Do not Pass line so gamblers can bet on the dice to lose. Afterwords, he developed the boxes for Place bets and put in place the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.