Position (roulette)

Position is the outdated expression for the placement of tokens as a bet on the tableau of French roulette tables .

Up until the end of the 19th century , the process of "placing" was characterized by the heavy weight of the material and the size in which the tokens were made by hand at that time. In the absence of raw materials and manufacturing techniques available today, the "playmakers" came up with a number of ideas, on the one hand to have their tokens manufactured in a forgery-proof manner, on the other hand to ensure the least possible abrasion. Different materials such as resin-coated oak, ivory and glass were not uncommon; This meant that the combinations, which were different in shape and color, piled up on the cloth of the gaming table. Only a few tokens placed one on top of the other gave the viewer the impression of small towers , the very structures through which the term "positions" became established. It was left to the skill of the player or the croupier to whom a bet was placed for the advertisement to place the tokens, which were often uneven and worn, so skilfully that after the drawing of the chance of winning it was clear to what extent and at what level Chances the bets were made with the "playmakers".

In the course of the 20th century with the beginning of automated production and the introduction of synthetic raw materials for the production of tokens, the increasingly flatter token emerged , which was quickly produced in large quantities in modernized casinos , which has displaced the term position in parlance .

Only with the advent of the fully automated American roulette tables, where machines sort and "build turrets" for the croupier, did the term come back to life , because the machine-friendly chips have now become thicker and heavier again. A set combination placed by a player in his token color is called a marked position .

The Casino of Monte Carlo has the most extensive collection of old tokens from all epochs and at times positions are recreated on antique roulette tables in the original tokens of their time.