Craps

Read more about the
Las Vegas 2024 Super
Bowl Streaker!

Be cunning, play cunning, and master craps the ideal way!

Games that use dice and the dice themselves date all the way back to the Middle Eastern Crusades, but modern craps is approximately a century old. Modern craps come about from the old Anglo game referred to as Hazard. No one knows for certain the ancestry of the game, however Hazard is said to have been made up by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, around the twelfth century. It is believed that Sir William’s knights bet on Hazard during a siege on the fortification Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was acquired from the fortress’s name.

Early French colonizers brought the game Hazard to Canada. In the 18th century, when banished by the British, the French moved down south and settled in the south of Louisiana where they eventually became known as Cajuns. When they departed Acadia, they brought their best-loved game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns simplified the game and made it fair mathematically. It’s said that the Cajuns changed 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 moved to the Mississippi barges and across the nation. A few think the dice maker John H. Winn as the creator of modern craps. In 1907, Winn developed the current craps setup. He created the Don’t Pass line so players can bet on the dice to lose. Later, he created the spaces for Place bets and put in place the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.