The middleweight division was one of the first weight divisions in Mexican "lucha libre" to have a specific championship as the Mexican National Middleweight Championship was created in 1933. When the Mexican professional wrestling promotion Empresa Mexicana de Lucha Libre ("Mexican Wrestling Enterprise"; EMLL) was founded in September 1933, they became one of several Mexican promotions to promote the championship. EMLL later created the World Middleweight Championship to represent the highest level prize of the middleweight division, higher than the Mexican National Middleweight Championship. In 1952, EMLL joined the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) and changed the title to the NWA World Middleweight Championship.