Pickup Craps – Hints and Strategies: The Background of Craps
Be clever, play cunning, and pickup craps the correct way!
Games that use dice and the dice themselves goes all the way back to the Crusades, but current craps is only about 100 years old. Current craps evolved from the 12th Century Anglo game called Hazard. Nobody knows for certain the ancestry of the game, however Hazard is believed to have been invented by the Anglo, Sir William of Tyre, sometime in the twelfth century. It is theorized that Sir William’s paladins wagered on Hazard during a blockade on the fortress Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was derived from the fortification’s name.
Early French colonists imported the game Hazard to Nova Scotia. In the 18th century, when banished by the British, the French relocated down south and located refuge in the south of Louisiana where they eventually became Cajuns. When they were driven out of Acadia, they brought their favored game, Hazard, with them. The Cajuns streamlined the game and made it fair mathematically. It’s said that the Cajuns altered the name to craps, which was gotten from the name of the losing toss of 2 in the game of Hazard, known as "crabs."
From Louisiana, the game extended to the Mississippi barges and all over the nation. Most consider the dice builder John H. Winn as the father of modern craps. In 1907, Winn built the current craps layout. He created the Don’t Pass line so gamblers can wager on the dice to not win. Afterwords, he established the boxes for Place bets and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.