You can learn more about Roulette from The Online Guide to Traditional Games. 'no place shall be kept for the playing of the said game of Roulette or Roly-Poly'. II of 1745 stated 'And whereas as certain pernicious game called Roulette or Roly-Poly is daily practiced'. Like many English games, the earliest mentions are in legal documents banning the game. is the direct English ancestor of modern Roulette.ĭocumentary evidence indicates that the game of roulette sprung up in the 18th century. Roulette in French means 'Small Wheel' which again points back to a French origin of the game.Į.O., a relative of Roulette seems to have become rapidly very popular in the 1770s until it was banned by statute around 1782, and it could well be that E.O. Another theory is that French Dominican monks invented Roulette, basing it upon an old Tibetan game in which the object was to arrange 37 animal statuettes into a magic number square of 666. Some attribute the invention to a French scientist called Blaise Pascal during his monastic retreat on 1655. While the European version has 37 pockets, the American roulette game has 38 pockets. The only difference between the two games can be seen in the wheel. The game’s rules and playing format remains the same as the European version. Roulette seems to have been invented by monks in a French monastery, in the 17th century. Coming in second in terms of popularity is the American roulette game.
