» Facts About Keno

The game of keno, which has the features of Bingo and any lottery, is nowadays popular all over the world. Keno was introduced in China by its head of state more than 2000 years ago. But the appearance of keno is wrapped in a mystery. Several different versions exist.
The generally accepted theory is that the game was invented during some war in China when the army needed money badly. The head of state had no money support of his subjects. So the emperor tried to work out a strategy of generating the necessary finances. Cheung found an excellent solution to this problem: he created a very popular game - keno. Keno helped Cheung win that war. The Great Wall was also built with the help of the money that gave keno! Later keno was known as the White Pigeon game as people of surrounding villages were informed of the winning numbers by carrier pigeons.
The keno boards of the past consisted of the Chinese characters but not of the numbers. Originally, as many as 120 characters were used in the game, and only after it left China would the number drop to a more familiar 80.
Thousads of Chinese immigrants, who came to America to work in the mines in the mid 1800's, brought keno there. The fact that gambling games were forbidden didn't prevent the Chinese from playing and spreading it all over the States. It continued to use Chinese characters and thus obviously didn't enter popular mainstream American culture until it was modified to include the numerical system.