 Boxing.
Fighting
with fists was a sport about 6,000 years ago in what is now known
as Ethiopia, from where it spread to ancient Egypt and eventually
throughout the Mediterranean area. Ancient Crete also had a boxing-like
sport, which probably developed independently, about 1,500 B.C.
Although the sport wasn't added to the ancient Olympic program until
688 B.C., some sort of boxing had become pretty well established
among the Greeks before that time. In one form of Greek boxing,
the two combatants simply sat on stones facing and pounded away
at one another until one of them was knocked out. Boxing in the
Olympics wasn't quite that brutal, but there were no breaks in the
action. Fighters wore leather thongs, originally to protect their
hands and wrists. As time went on, harder leather was used, turning
the thongs into weapons. The Romans added iron or brass studs, creating
the cestus, which could be a deadly weapon. Then they went even
farther, developing a cruel, spur-like instrument of bronze, called
the myrmex ("limb piercer"). Boxing in the Roman Empire
was not so much a sport as a bloody amusement for spectators, like
the gladiatorial contests, with slaves pitted against one another
in a fight to the death. he myrmex was finally abolished and boxing
itself was banned by Rome about 30 B.C. The Romans had made one
small contribution to the sport: They invented the ring, originally
a simple marked circle. With the spread of Christianity, pugilism
in any form evidently disappeared from Europe completely. It resurfaced
in England in the late 17th century. A London newspaper referred
to a bout in 1681, and the Royal Theatre in London was the site
of regularly scheduled matches in 1698. The sport at that time was
actually a mixture of wrestling and boxing. Although hitting with
fists was emphasized, a boxer could grab and throw his opponent,
then jump on him and hit him while he was down. James Figg, who
opened a boxing academy in London in 1719, introduced a measure
of skill to the sport. Figg was an expert fencer as well as a boxer,
and his academy was patterned after the fencing academies of the
period. He taught parrying and counter-punching, just as fencing
masters taught parries and ripostes to their students. Figg won
great publicity for his academy by challenging all comers to bouts
of boxing or cudgeling, He never lost, and was generally considered
champion of Great Britain until he retired in 1730. His success
inspired the establishment of several other boxing academies in
London, and the fact that he was a fencer also gave the sport some
prestige. A number of "gentlemen amateurs" took up boxing
as a pastime. They also became enthusiastic fans at prize fights.
One of Figg's pupils, Jack Broughton, became known as the "father
of English boxing." Broughton, generally acknowledged as champion
from 1729 to 1750, taught boxing and operated an arena in London.
In 1743, he drew up the first formal rules for the sport. Under
Broughton's rules, there was a 3-foot square in the center of the
ring. When a fighter was knocked down, his handlers had 30 seconds
to get him into position on one side of the square, facing his opponent.
In effect, this marked the first division of a bout into rounds,
since each knockdown ended fighting for at least 30 seconds. Although
wrestling holds were permitted, a boxer was not allowed to grab
his opponent below the waist. Broughton also invented the first
boxing gloves, known as "mufflers," to protect not only
the hands but also the face from blows. However, they were used
only in practice, not in actual fights. The rules devised by Broughton
were used throughout England with only minor modifications until
1838, when the Pugilistic Society (founded in 1814) developed the
London Prize Ring Rules. The new code called for a ring 24 feet
square, enclosed by two ropes. A knockdown marked the end of a round.
After a 30-second break, the fighters were given eight seconds to
"come to scratch," unaided, in the center of the ring.
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