Go 10 Rounds With This History of Boxing Quiz

Boxing has been a sport at every Summer Olympics since 1904, except when the event was held in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1912. Swedish law banned the sport at the time, so boxing was removed from the lineup. Notably, however, Sweden introduced medals for architecture, literature, music, painting, and sculpture (which were later phased out).

Marciano and Floyd Mayweather might be the most famous undefeated boxers, but no one went more matches without a loss than Jimmy Wilde. In 1911 alone, he went 27-0-1. Ultimately, he made it to 93-0-1 before his first loss, and he ended his career 132-3-1.

The first-ever Black heavyweight champ was Jack Johnson, who held the title from 1908 to 1915. Johnson was also the first fighter to officially compete in five different decades; he started his career in the late 1890s and finished in the early 1930s. Joe Louis became the second Black heavyweight champ when he beat James Braddock in 1937, while Jersey Joe Walcott and Sonny Liston won their titles in the 1950s and '60s, respectively.

Ali was a dominant force when he was young, winning gold at the 1960 Olympics (where he still went by Cassius Clay), and winning the heavyweight belt from Sonny Liston in 1964, when he was 22. But his true greatness was his resiliency, and when he beat Leon Spinks in 1978, he became the first heavyweight to win the title three times.

In the first half of the 20th century, heavyweight Jack Dempsey was one of America’s biggest stars. His 1921 fight with Georges Carpentier in Jersey City was the first ever million-dollar gate, bringing in $1,789,238. Dempsey took home $300,000 after winning by KO in the fourth round.

Rocky Marciano's 49-0 record is one of the most impressive in boxing. Nicknamed the Brockton Blockbuster, Marciano is the only heavyweight champion in history to retire undefeated, and the only one of these four to retire with the belt. He held the world heavyweight title from 1952 to 1956 before retiring at age 32 with 43 knockouts.

Pound-for-pound rankings are how fans have ranked fighters across weight divisions for decades; outlets including "Sports Illustrated," ESPN, and "The Ring" all publish pound-for-pound lists. Although there's evidence the phrase was used in boxing in the 1920s (and possibly even earlier), the fighter most commonly associated with its prevalence is Sugar Ray Robinson, who fought in four weight classes (lightweight, welterweight, middleweight, and light heavyweight) in the 1940s, '50s, and '60s, and is often ranked as the No. 1 pound-for-pound boxer of all time.

The oldest fighter in any weight class to win a title is middleweight/light heavyweight Bernard Hopkins, who won belts at 46, 48, and 49 years old. But the oldest heavyweight to win boxing’s most famous belt was 45-year-old George Foreman, who defeated 26-year-old Michael Moorer in 1994 to become champ.

Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield's WBA Heavyweight Championship match on June 28, 1997, was promoted as "the Sound and the Fury" — but today it's more commonly known as the "Bite Fight." Although Holyfield was the underdog coming into the match, he won the first two rounds handily. In the third round, a frustrated Tyson bit off a piece of his opponent's ear, earning just a minor deduction. When he did it again after the action resumed, he was disqualified.

Muhammad Ali was involved in many of boxing’s most famous (and memorably named) fights, including the "Thrilla in Manila," the "Fight of the Century" (in NYC), and the "Rumble in the Jungle." The latter took place on October 30, 1974, in Kinshasa, Zaire, and pitted Ali, 32, against a then-25-year-old George Foreman. Ali knocked out Foreman in the eighth round to become the heavyweight champion of the world for a second time.