History
The use of hand protection in fighting contests undertaken for sport has been known since at least Ancient Greece. In the 2nd century, Clement of Alexandria credited the mythological Amycus, son of Poseidon and King of the Bebryces in Anatolia, with having invented boxing gloves. However, both the gloves and the sport itself were very different from modern boxing. In Ancient Greece, it was common practice to tie strips of leather round the hands for protection. In Roman times, this developed into the gladiatorial cestus, with metal added to the gloves to inflict greater damage. The use of the cestus was banned c. 50 BC, and 'boxing' was banned under Arcadius in 393 AD.
Boxing experienced a revival in Britain around the 17th century. Many bouts were fought with bare knuckles and with no standard rules until the London Prize Ring rules, though sometimes gloves were worn. Gloves were mandated by the Marquess of Queensberry rules which were published in 1867. Subsequently, the popularity of bare knuckle fights has waned, and they are now of dubious legality in some countries.
The modern padded glove owes its origin to Jack Broughton, who created a form of boxing glove (referred to as 'mufflers') in the 19th century.
Read more about this topic: Boxing Glove
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“The history of work has been, in part, the history of the worker’s body. Production depended on what the body could accomplish with strength and skill. Techniques that improve output have been driven by a general desire to decrease the pain of labor as well as by employers’ intentions to escape dependency upon that knowledge which only the sentient laboring body could provide.”
—Shoshana Zuboff (b. 1951)
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—Camille Paglia (b. 1947)
“I am ashamed to see what a shallow village tale our so-called History is. How many times must we say Rome, and Paris, and Constantinople! What does Rome know of rat and lizard? What are Olympiads and Consulates to these neighboring systems of being? Nay, what food or experience or succor have they for the Esquimaux seal-hunter, or the Kanaka in his canoe, for the fisherman, the stevedore, the porter?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)