Master Craps – Pointers and Plans: The Past of Craps
Posted in Craps on 11/15/2024 06:25 pm by Philip
Be clever, play smart, and master craps the proper way!
Games that use dice and the dice themselves date back to the Middle Eastern Crusades, but modern craps is just about a century old. Current craps evolved from the 12th Century English game referred to as Hazard. No one absolutely knows the birth of the game, although Hazard is said to have been created by the Anglo, Sir William of Tyre, around the 12th century. It’s theorized that Sir William’s knights enjoyed Hazard during a blockade on the fortress Hazarth in 1125 AD. The title Hazard was derived from the castle’s name.
Early French colonizers imported the game Hazard to Nova Scotia. In the 1700s, when banished by the English, the French relocated down south and discovered safety in southern Louisiana where they at a later time became known as Cajuns. When they were driven out of Acadia, they brought their favorite game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns modernized the game and made it more mathematically fair. It is believed that the Cajuns altered the name to craps, which was derived from the name of the losing throw of 2 in the game of Hazard, known as "crabs."
From Louisiana, the game extended to the Mississippi river boats and all over the country. Many think the dice builder John H. Winn as the founder of current craps. In 1907, Winn designed the modern craps layout. He added the Don’t Pass line so gamblers could wager on the dice to lose. Afterwords, he invented the boxes for Place bets and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.