The History of Keno

Keno is easily one of the most popular casino games. It was first introduced in China in 187 BC by Cheung Heung. It involved choosing 10 from the 120 characters of China. The beginning of the game was quite mysterious. Several variations existed.

One theory asserts that a game similar to modern keno was introduced by Cheung Leung form the Han Dynasty sometime in 200 BC. Apparently, the city was in a war for many years and their money as well as supplies was getting depleted. The citizens declined to donate extra funds to the futile cause, and Cheung was left wondering where to source out the needed finances to carry on his ruthless battles. At last, Cheung came up with the idea of making a game that would attract huge numbers of people under his command while at the same time producing some sort of cash that would protect his expenses. The game was a success and was touted as a principal reason for the victory of Cheung's forces. It is also recognized for supplying resources and generating funds for the massive task of constructing the Great Wall.

Eventually, the game was known as the game of the White Pigeon , because pigeons were used to notify nearby towns and villages of the drawn numbers. Out of this emerged a Chinese poem of a thousand numbers. The 'thousand character classic', as it is referred, is a set of separate characters arranged in a rhyming form. It was originally devised as a learning tool for children, but the poem reached immense popularity that the characters are now frequently used as a system of romantic numbering. Instead of using a board of purely numbers on the original keno boards, these characters were used. Initially, 120 characters were used in the game, only when it left China was the number dwindled to 80.

The game was brought to the US in the middle of the 19th century when immigrants from China worked in the mines and on the railroad. Although initially banned, Keno was secretly played by these new immigrants. Its popularity gave rise to the name "Chinese lottery", principally in cities with large Chinese populations, such as San Francisco. Chinese characters remained in use and as a result, it was not inserted into the popular mainstream culture of the Americans until it was altered to include the numerical system.

In the tradition of the Wild West, when gambling was legitimated in the state of Nevada in 1931 the truth that lotteries were not authorized by the legislature was not a hindrance to everyone. Everything necessitated a change in the name to one that was not linked to a lottery-like game. Soon, it was called as 'horse race keno' which was based on the idea that the numbers are horses which you wanted to finish ahead. When a law was passed by the government that regulated off-track betting, Nevada quickly modified the name again, shortening it to just keno.