Be smart, play smart, and pickup craps the proper way!
Dice and dice games date back to the Middle Eastern Crusades, but current craps is approximately a century old. Modern craps formed from the 12th Century Anglo game referred to as Hazard. No one absolutely knows the origin of the game, although Hazard is believed to have been discovered by the Anglo, Sir William of Tyre, sometime in the twelfth century. It is supposed that Sir William’s horsemen bet on Hazard through a siege on the fortification Hazarth in 1125 AD. The title Hazard was acquired from the citadel’s name.
Early French settlers imported the game Hazard to Acadia. In the 18th century, when displaced by the British, the French relocated south and settled in southern Louisiana where they eventually became Cajuns. When they departed Acadia, they took their favored game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns simplified the game and made it more mathematically fair. It is believed that the Cajuns altered the name to craps, which is derived from the term for the non-winning throw of 2 in the game of Hazard, recognized as "crabs."
From Louisiana, the game migrated to the Mississippi scows and across the nation. A few consider the dice builder John H. Winn as the father of modern craps. In the early 1900s, Winn assembled the current craps setup. He appended the Don’t Pass line so players can wager on the dice to not win. Afterwords, he developed the boxes for Place bets and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.