Roulette: The “King” of Casino Games
Roulette is one of many casino games with its roots in France. It is named after a French word meaning small wheel. However small the wheel may be, this game is able to pay out pretty big returns for a wager.
Players’ place a wager on a number, the colour red or black, a range of numbers or odd and even numbers. There are 37 numbers in a European roulette wheel and 38 in the US version. Quite honestly when it comes to a casino game where the odds are based in favour of the house, US roulette is out; for better odds players should choose the European version.
Roulette as a casino game was devised in 18th century France, and as early as 1796 this game was written about in a French novel. During the 1800’s it spread all over Europe and into the USA, and has since become one of the most famous and most popular of all casino games.
In Europe, gambling was abolished in many countries other than Monte Carlo, and this country became a gambling Mecca for the European elite. It is because roulette was associated with this elite group of people and the glamour of Monte Carlo that it has become known as the “King” of casino games.
A legend tells that the exporter of roulette through Europe, François Blanc, allegedly bargained with the devil to obtain the secret of the game. This springs from the fact that the sum of the numbers on the wheel, 1 – 36 equals 666, supposedly the “number of the “beast”.