Be clever, play cunning, and become versed in craps the correct way!
Games that use dice and the dice themselves date back to the Crusades, but current craps is only about a century old. Current craps evolved from the ancient Anglo game referred to as Hazard. No one knows for certain the ancestry of the game, however Hazard is believed to have been made up by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, sometime in the twelfth century. It’s theorized that Sir William’s knights played Hazard through a siege on the fortress Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was acquired from the citadel’s name.
Early French colonists imported the game Hazard to Nova Scotia. In the 18th century, when driven away by the English, the French moved south and located refuge in southern Louisiana where they at a later time became Cajuns. When they left Acadia, they took their preferred game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns modernized the game and made it fair mathematically. It’s said that the Cajuns changed the name to craps, which is acquired from the term for the losing throw of snake-eyes in the game of Hazard, known as "crabs."
From Louisiana, the game moved to the Mississippi scows and across the country. A few think the dice builder John H. Winn as the founder of modern craps. In 1907, Winn built the modern craps setup. He created the Do not Pass line so players can wager on the dice to not win. Afterwords, he designed the boxes for Place wagers and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.