Etymology

roulette

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Today it means: A game of chance in which a small ball is made to move round rapidly on a circle divided off into numbered (usually red and black) spaces. When the ball stops, it indicates the result of a variety of wagers permitted by the game. Full definition →

French roulette
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The story

  1. French · borrowed fromroulette“roulette, little wheel”
  2. English todayroulette

Borrowed from French roulette (“roulette, little wheel”). The sense "situation with a random chance of incurring serious harm" may be abstracted from Russian roulette.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.