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The History of Keno

The history of Keno begins in China over two thousand years ago and continues into the 21st-century online casino. It is a long and fascinating story that combines elements of ancient Chinese culture with modern Internet technology, and the story still continues to develop.

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Ancient Keno History

Keno is a lottery-type game, which began over two thousand years ago in China. This game of chance was created by a man named Cheung Leung, in order to raise money for a weak army. Villagers were tired and disillusioned and Leung had no desire to raise taxes in order to attain the funds necessary to save his city.

Leung developed a game in which players had to buy tickets to play, and choose their "lot" from 120 Chinese characters. This innovation was introduced in the hope that the locals would try their luck, place their bets, and pay money to have a chance to win.

Leung's game proved to be very successful, and he managed to save his city by strengthening his army with money raised from the game. In those days, carrier pigeons were used to advise villagers of the results. For this reason the ancient game was sometimes known as the "White Pigeon Game". It is believed that the Great Wall of China was built with money made from the Keno game. Keno is a game of luck which is quite straightforward to play. Leung would have probably been very surprised to learn that his simple game would last for so many years and would become popular in many places around the globe.

Modern Keno

The game of Keno was brought to the United States by Chinese immigrants who arrived to work on the railways in the 1800's. For many years, the game was known as the "Chinese Lottery". In the original game, players had to choose Chinese characters rather than numbers.. These characters were part of an ancient Chinese rhyming poem. People who understood the poem and characters would often make their choice according to its meaning or artistic association. Once Keno reached America, the characters were changed to numbers so that it became a more attractive game for those who did not understand the Chinese characters.

Casino Keno

In the 1930's, Keno was introduced into the casino arena. However, although gambling had been made legal in parts of the United States, lotteries were not permitted in the casino, so the game was then renamed "Horse Race Keno", as a ploy to ensure its entrance to the casinos. Players were to make their choice out of eighty numbers in this lottery-type game, which officially was not a lottery. Once a tax was imposed by the U.S. Government on off-track horse racing, the "horse race" part of Keno's name was dropped and the game became "Keno".

Online Keno Is Born

One of the most significant events in Keno history was the creation of the online casino in the 1990s. Online Keno is essentially the same game as casino Keno, but it is much easier without messy papers and pencils, much less stressful without the fear of losing your winnings if you don't pay attention, and of course more convenient. The ease of playing Keno online has attracted many new players and has brought the game of Keno to levels of popularity that would have been unimaginable just a few decades ago.

The success of this ancient game and its lasting durability over the years do suggest that the appealing game of Keno will be around for many more years to come. There are undoubtedly chapters in the history of Keno yet to be written.

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