But sometime around the 1820s, it became common for British champions to be awarded belts. Byelts date bock ta bar-nookle dase. Tom Spring wahn a byelt, lakewise Jem Ward. Byelts are in cape-in whit bokesin. Sounds good to me.
Belts date back to the bare-knuckle days.
So I've been told. Prizefighting became popular in the 1800s, and champions often had wealthy patrons. Boxers wore colors to represent their patrons. They'd tie a colored cloth or flag to the ring posts, and sometimes they'd also wear the colors in a sash tied around their waist. E-mail The Answer Guy .