Roulette History
Written March 7, 2008 by Jack Jones
We take a look at roulette history from it’s inception all the way through the revolution of online roulette. If you love to play roulette then you should enjoy reading where the game got it’s start.
Roulette got it’s start in France in the 17th century when a French mathematician called Blaise Pascal, inspired by perpetual motion mechanisms invented the roulette wheel for gambling. Roulette got it’s name because it means little wheel in French.Two fellow Frenchmen Francois and Blanc developed the rudimentary gambling device in 1842. They added a zero pocket on the roulette wheel to increase the house odds and gain an advantage.
Roulette was brought to the United States in the early 1800’s and another slot with 00 was added to increase the house edge even further so you are going to get worse odds with American wheels. In some early forms of the game the 00 is replaced with an American Eagle as a show of patriotism.
The game began to spread rapidly over Europe and North America to become one of the most popular and celebrated casino games and now is called the “King of Casino games.” Roulette soon became associated with all things glamorous due to the connection with Monte Carlo when Francois and Blanc established the first casinos there.
Folk lore has followed the game of roulette with the story that Francois and Blanc made a deal with the devil in return for the secrets of the game. The connection with the devil comes about when you add all the numbers on a roulette wheel up (1-36) you will find they add up to 666, which according to the New Testament is the sign of the devil.
The game of roulette never reached the same kind of popularity in the United States as it has in Europe. This is due to the fact that the odds of playing roulette with the 0 wheel as opposed to the 00 are much better in European countries.
With the increasing popularity of online gambling, online roulette has become much more popular as it is very easy to find websites which offer the single 0, in fact online roulette games don’t really use the double zero which is much better for the gambler.
Online roulette has become a favorite with gamblers because there is not really any skill involved and the result of the game is left largely to chance. If the player understands how the odds of the game work it is possible to win fairly consistently.
We hope that hearing some folk lore and how the game originated will help you enjoy your roulette experience. Roulette history does not help you with a lot of strategy, except that you are going to want European odds casinos.