Crafted from a captivating rose-gold bronze alloy with a red felt-wrapped grip by Société Technique d'Equipement et de Fournitures Industrielle, this Torch was instrumental in lighting the Olympic Flame during an historic Opening Ceremony where for the first time a temporary stadium was built.

Supported by scaffolding, it was able to hold 60,000 spectators to watch an Opening Ceremony attended by French President Charles de Gaulle along with 500 invited guests of honour, including International Olympic Committee President Avery Brundage, the Irani empress Farah Pahlavi, the Danish Crown Princess Margrethe and the Grand Duchess of Luxembourg Josephine Charlotte.

The Torch was lit at Olympia in Greece three days after it was supposed to be due to an attempted coup d'état of King Constantine II, who had been forced from his throne eight months before, against the dictatorial military regime of Georgios Papadopoulos.

The route of the Torch Relay at first led over Mount Olympus to Athens before being flown to Paris where it was met by Jean Vuarnet, the 1960 Olympic downhill gold medallist.

He handed it on to the first Torchbearer Alain Mimoun, the 1956 Olympic marathon gold medallist.

The Relay in France went over a distance of 7,222 kilometres through 41 districts and 170 towns with 5,000 Torchbearers, who transported the Torch on foot, by bike, by boat, by skies or by motorbike.

The part of the way that led through the old harbour of Marseilles was done by a diver who, while swimming, held the Torch just over the surface of the water.

The Torchbearers were accompanied by around 80,000 athletes and watched by an audience of about two million people. The last stop on the day before the Opening Ceremony was Saint-Pierre-de-Chartreuse.

At the back of the temporarily constructed stadium, there was a steel scaffold that kept host to the Olympic Flame, located in a four-metre-wide bowl at the top, which also was able to take 550 kilograms in weight.

There were also stairs leading to the top, containing 96 steps, which figure skater Alain Calmat, the Innsbruck 1964 silver medallist climbed and lit the Flame.

A previous Grenoble 1968 Torch sold by Boston-based RR Auction in September 2019 fetched $225,000 (£175,000/€203,000).

Last November, Ingrid O’Neil sold an Olympic Torch from the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley, once in the possession of Walt Disney, for $720,000 (£560,000/€647,000).

A Torch from Albertville 1992, the next time France hosted the Winter Olympics after Grenoble 1968, also proved to be popular and sold for $41,321 (£32,145/€37,133), while one used at Lillehammer 1994 went under the hammer for $37,500 (£29,200/€33,700).

Another Winter Olympic Torch, from Sapporo 1972, sold for $18,750 (£14,600/€16,850).

Olympic Torches from a number of other Games were also sold, including one from Tokyo 2020, a Torch Relay that took place largely in private due to the COVID-19 pandemic, for $11,354 (£8,832/€10,203).