Be brilliant, play clever, and pickup craps the proper 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. Current craps developed from the ancient Anglo game referred to as Hazard. Nobody knows for sure the ancestry of the game, but Hazard is believed to have been invented by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, sometime in the twelfth century. It is presumed that Sir William’s knights bet on Hazard amid a siege on the fortress Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was derived from the citadel’s name.
Early French colonizers imported the game Hazard to Nova Scotia. In the 18th century, when driven away by the English, the French relocated south and settled in southern Louisiana where they at a later time became Cajuns. When they left Acadia, they brought their favorite game, Hazard, with them. The Cajuns broke down the game and made it mathematically fair. It is said that the Cajuns changed the title to craps, which was derived from the term for the non-winning toss of 2 in the game of Hazard, known as "crabs."
From Louisiana, the game migrated to the Mississippi barges and across the country. Many consider the dice builder John H. Winn as the creator of current craps. In 1907, Winn designed the current craps setup. He added the Don’t Pass line so players can bet on the dice to not win. Afterwords, he developed the boxes for Place bets and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.