Be brilliant, play brilliant, and master craps the proper way!
Dice and dice games goes back to the Middle Eastern Crusades, but current craps is just about a century old. Modern craps evolved from the ancient Anglo game called Hazard. No one knows for certain the birth of the game, although Hazard is believed to have been discovered by the Anglo, Sir William of Tyre, in the twelfth century. It’s supposed that Sir William’s knights played Hazard during a blockade on the castle Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was derived from the fortress’s name.
Early French colonizers brought the game Hazard to Acadia. In the 18th century, when expelled by the English, the French moved down south and settled in southern Louisiana where they a while later became known as Cajuns. When they left Acadia, they took their favored game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns broke down the game and made it fair mathematically. It is believed that the Cajuns adjusted the name to craps, which is derived from the term for the losing toss of two in the game of Hazard, known 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 father of modern craps. In the early 1900s, Winn created the current craps layout. He added the Don’t Pass line so gamblers could wager on the dice to lose. Afterwords, he designed the spaces for Place bets and put in place the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.
