History of Gambling

Those of us that love to gamble have always taken for granted the fact that it seems like it has always been with us, but haven't you ever wondered where gambling originated from. The history of gambling has been a long road of study for many athropologists that have taken them all the way to the beginning of human civilization. So lets start by tracing the steps all the way to the first gambling in human history. the first artifacts that could be recognized as materials that could have been used for actual gambling were found to date more then 40,000 years back in a cromagnon cave where bones of animals were made into objects that resembled dice. Imagine our ancestors after a long days hunt coming home happy and in a good mood ready to gamble and have a great time while having a great feast cooked over an open flame. This is what I consider more of a prehistoric gambling game, but who was the first civilization to actually have an actual gambling game?

The Chinese were always way ahead of other civilizations in many inventions, and actually invented gunpowder thousands of years before the west did, so don't be surprised if they also beat everyone out when it came to creating the first actual gambling game made for the masses. Around 4300 years back chinese inventors came out with a gambling game that used (of all things) tiles. My uncle is a tile setter and im sure that he will be very amused and fascinated to know about this.

The Egyptians also got in on the gambling actions 3500 years back archeologists found a pair of dice that were made from ivory tusks which they used to get the gambling party started. 400 years after that the ancient greeks also took breaks from their hard labor and enjoyed many a dice game. Imagine the Spartans with their strict warrior code also throwing their spears aside and allowing themselves the pleasure of doing some old fashion gambling?  The crazy thing about this is that during the height of the mighty Roman Empire one of the leaders back then came out with a law that made it mandatory for all children to learn how to gamble. Imagine that happening these days? I can just imagine the uproar this would have caused in modern day society. I guess the might Roman Empire wasn't so strict after all .