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| 1/12/2008 | Craps is one of the most popular casino games in the world. Its recent history is very clear, but how the game got started is up for debate.
Some circles claim it is the descendent of a game called Hazard that was played during the crusades and was invented then, but there are others that believe it traces even farther back and is Arabic in origin.
One thing is fairly certain: dice games are the oldest gambling games known to men. The Roman Empire had a dice-type game, from whence the term “roll the bones” developed.
Modern style dice has been found in Egypt and dated to 600 B.C. Dice were very popular in the Arabic world for many centuries, but much of the history is unclear.
Original dice could be traced to a pre-history, when shamans and fortunetellers would throw bones, sticks, stones and other elements to try to predict the future.
By the Roman Empire, they had developed into more advanced creations.
When gambling with dice actually began is unclear. But craps’ predecessor, Hazard, might have come from the seizing of a castle by the English in 1512 or maybe even before. It was played by English and French aristocracy for several hundred years.
However, when it became craps is relatively clear. The name craps comes from the French version of the crabs, which was a translation of hazard. As with many gambling games, it got it start with the U.S. riverboats of the 1800s.
Modern craps was essentially born in Louisiana in 1813 in New Orleans when Bernard Mandeville brought the game from France, simplified it, and brought it to the Mississippi Riverboats of the 1800s.
It took off when in 1931, a man named John Winn changed the game, creating the bet structure the way it is now, with a right vs. wrong mentality - -a one way or the other betting structure that is still in use today. He simplified the game, and when casinos popped up in Las Vegas in 1934, the game exploded all over the world in the form it is in now.
Craps quite possibly was the most popular casino game in the world for many years, up until the 1940s and 50s when slot machines grew in popularity, and later blackjack.
Even though it is no longer the centerpiece of casino play, craps remains relatively popular because it is a social game where players often play together and attempt to beat the house. The wide variety of bets available makes it appealing too.
The game continues to evolve, and now it is a major staple of online gaming. Online craps is played the same as real craps, only the dice numbers are generated randomly on the computer.
While online play lacks the social atmosphere of the casino, it allows for more constant action and more player freedom and can be played from the privacy of a player’s home.
While card games have seemed to replace dice games in the gambling culture as the most popular games, dice games are still prominent. The history of the dice goes well beyond the history of cards, and as craps continues to evolve, perhaps new dice casino games will emerge as well.
In the long run, however, craps is the biggest casino descendent to times B.C. Dice games have been played almost since mankind could walk. While that bears no resemblance to the game we play today, it is interesting to note that craps has perhaps the most ancient – and most modern – history of any casino game. |
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