Antoine Gombaud, Chevalier de Méré

In 1654, Antoine Gombaud, Chevalier de Méré, approached Blaise Pascal with a question about the throw of dice and drew his attention to the problem of points, which had been around for 250 years or more in the Italian "abbaco" literature. A correspondence ensued between Pascal and Pierre de Fermat which is widely regarded as marking the birth of probability calculus. While historians of probability have rightfully focused on Pascal and Fermat, they have generally ignored Gombaud's part, portraying him only as a gambler, sometimes an avid one. Through a careful examination of Gombaud's life and philosophy, it is argued here that his role was more important than has usually been attributed to him. In addition, a review of the historical background to the problem of points shows that gambling was not as central to the early development of probability theory as has often been assumed.