History of Craps

Dice have been in existence for 1000′s of years (at least 2,000 years and counting), there exists evidence which dates the use of dice as far back as during the age of the Roman Empire.  Soldiers used the bones of sheep and pigs, shaped them into cubes and tossed the bones in a game to amuse themselves while in camp; this is assumed to be the source of the expression “roll them bones”.

The earliest use of dice is believed to be as an device in predicting the future thereby helping people to make a decision.  Over time the initial symbols used in fortune telling have been changed to the symbols we see on dice today, as dice were no longer made use of to predict the future.

As with any pastime this ancient there are various thoughts as to the way the game developed.  One theory has the source of the modern game of craps as an adaptation of a contest played by Arabs referred to as Azzahr since before the time of the Middle Ages.  After some time the game showed up in France where it was called Hasard, it appeared across the English Channel around 1500 there it was known by the English spelling of Hazard.  Formal rules for Hazard had been made by the early 1700’s.

When the French settled in New France (Quebec and parts of Nova Scotia) they brought with them the game.  When the French lost to the English in the new world numerous French settlers from Nova Scotia left Canada and migrated south ending up in Louisiana where they established settlements.  The French settlers continued to play Hasard but through time started to call the game Crebs or Creps, their way of spelling the French Crabes (The smallest achievable denomination in the game was known as Crabs by the English and Crabes by the French.  By 1843 the Cajun name came into American English as Craps.

As the frontier migrated west the dice game Craps migrated with it, Craps is now enjoyed all over The United States as well as the rest of the planet.  There are two types of craps being played “Street Craps” and “Bank Craps” in addition to a 3rd sort, an web-based version becoming popular called “Online Craps”.  Estimates conservatively place the quantity of U.S. citizens that play dice games yearly at 30 million.