Gambling with dice have been with us since the dawn of civilization. The materials used to sculpt the earliest dice were probably shaped from animal bone or pieces of wood like ebony and oak. However, we know that for more than two thousand years Roman soldiers in a similar game that consisted of throwing bones of pig knuckles onto their shields, which was baptized with the name of “bones”.
But determining precisely how and when it originated the game of craps as well as the roots of his name and the whole craps history is certainly open to debate. But here is one of those theories:
Arabs adopted the pastime of “throwing the bones” (rolling dice) that had brought the Midwestern legionaries during the expansion of the Roman Empire. The Arabs made these little numbered cubes called “azzahr. Eventually the game came back across the trade routes to Europe during the Middle Ages, in France was called “Hazar” or “hasard”. During the interminable wars between France and England in the thirteenth and fourteenth century, English knights brought the game home and named it “hazard” – meaning to take a chance or a risk (as the word says in English).
As the English game to its lowest they called “crabs.” But after another war, French soldiers picked up this variation of the game, but maintained their linguistic independence, called “crab”. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, French colonists took the game to the Canadian border, and while England extended its reach in North America many of these settlers migrated to Louisiana where the end of the century appeared a simplified version of Hazard lost “or risk missing simply took the name of “pancakes”, but the descendants of French settlers continue writing “crab”.
As Cajun riverboat journeyed up the Mississippi River, this old game attracted the attention of anglophone residents of the area. This time the American colonists adopted the game and corrupted the name to “craps“. At the time of the Americans spread out across the West, dice, craps or treat in a game is essential to every saloon and casino in the land. After the American Civil War, a producer of dice maker introduced an innovation that made imperfectly dice of the past, which opened the doors to third parties bet for or against someone who threw the dice. While the growing popularity of dice, different ways of betting emerged simultaneously. Among the best known are: Bets Difficult (Hardway) and type Horn (Horn Bets). The incorporation of new forms of gambling not only added to the popularity and excitement of the game, but also the odds for players and spectators.
Today the game of dice or craps, is one of the most popular games in any casino worldwide. Craps tables are easy to spot on the casino – are those that attract many people and where emotion the rapt fascination. Online craps games do not provide the exact same atmosphere but players can play for real money from comfort of their homes.