Craps TipsBeginner Craps Tips

Read more about the
Las Vegas 2024 Super
Bowl Streaker!

Be smart, play cunning, and learn how to play craps the right way!

Dice and dice games date back to the Crusades, but modern craps is only about 100 years old. Modern craps evolved from the ancient English game referred to as Hazard. Nobody absolutely knows the ancestry of the game, however Hazard is said to have been invented by the Anglo, Sir William of Tyre, in the 12th century. It’s supposed that Sir William’s paladins gambled on Hazard amid a siege on the castle Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was derived from the castle’s name.

Early French colonizers brought the game Hazard to Acadia. In the 1700s, when banished by the English, the French headed down south and discovered sanctuary in the south of Louisiana where they a while later became Cajuns. When they were driven out of Acadia, they took their favored game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns modernized the game and made it more mathematically fair. It’s believed that the Cajuns altered the name to craps, which is gotten from the name of the bad luck toss of two in the game of Hazard, referred to as "crabs."

From Louisiana, the game moved to the Mississippi barges and all over the country. A good many consider the dice builder John H. Winn as the founder of current 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. Afterwords, he developed the boxes for Place wagers and put in place the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.