Cassius Clay is no more. The Black Superman who ‘floats like a butterfly and stings like a bee’ has hung up his gloves forever.

Former world heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali, whose record-setting boxing career, unprecedented flair for showmanship, and controversial stands made him one of the best known figures of the 20th century, died on Friday aged 74, media reports said.

 Family spokesman Bob Gunnell told NBC News that Ali died in a Phoenix area hospital. Reuters could not immediately confirm the report.

 ”My heart is deeply saddened yet both appreciative and relieved that the greatest is now resting in the greatest place,” boxer Roy Jones Jr. said on Twitter.

 Ali was hospitalized this week for a respiratory ailment. The former prizefighter had long been suffering from Parkinson’s syndrome, which impaired his speech and made the once graceful athlete almost a prisoner in his own body.

 Ali proclaimed himself “the greatest” as well as “the boldest, the prettiest, the most superior, most scientific, most skilful.”

 Few could argue with him at his peak in the 1960s. With his dancing feet and quick fists, he could as he put it float like a butterfly and sting like a bee. He was the first person to win the heavyweight championship three times.

 Ali became much more than a colourful and interesting athlete. He spoke boldly against racism in the 1960s, as well as the Vietnam War.

Ali was born in Louisville, Kentucky, on January 17, 1942, as Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr., a name shared with a 19th century slavery abolitionist. He later changed his name after his conversion to Islam.

 Ali is survived by his wife, the former Lonnie Williams, who knew him when she was a child in Louisville, along with his nine children.

Former President Bill Clinton – husband of Democratic frontrunner Hillary – said the boxer had been “courageous in the ring, inspiring to the young, compassionate to those in need, and strong and good-humoured in bearing the burden of his own health challenges”.

Republican presumptive presidential nominee Donald Trump, meanwhile, tweeted that Ali was “truly great champion and a wonderful guy. He will be missed by all!”

George Foreman, who lost his world title to Ali in the famous “Rumble in the Jungle” fight in Kinshasa in 1974, called him one of the greatest human beings he had ever met.

American civil rights campaigner Jesse Jackson said Ali had been willing to sacrifice the crown and money for his principles when he refused to serve in the Vietnam war.

  Muhammad Ali