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Dice and dice games goes back to the Middle Eastern Crusades, but modern craps is approximately a century old. Modern craps evolved from the old English game called Hazard. Nobody knows for certain the ancestry of the game, although Hazard is believed to have been invented by the Englishman, Sir William of Tyre, sometime in the twelfth century. It is theorized that Sir William’s soldiers gambled on Hazard amid a blockade on the citadel Hazarth in 1125 AD. The name Hazard was derived from the fortress’s name.
Early French colonizers brought the game Hazard to Nova Scotia. In the 1700s, when expelled by the English, the French headed south and settled in southern Louisiana where they a while later became Cajuns. When they fled Acadia, they took their preferred game, Hazard, along. The Cajuns streamlined the game and made it more mathematically fair. It’s believed that the Cajuns altered the title to craps, which is acquired from the name of the bad luck toss of 2 in the game of Hazard, referred to as "crabs."
From Louisiana, the game extended to the Mississippi river boats and across the nation. Many acknowledge the dice maker John H. Winn as the father of current craps. In the early 1900s, Winn built the current craps layout. He created the Do not Pass line so players could bet on the dice to not win. Later, he developed the spaces for Place bets and added the Big 6, Big 8, and Hardways.