The extremely rare item, believed to be one of only five of its kind, more than doubled its expected price tag of $175,000 (£104,000/€127,000) when it was sold by specialist Olympic memorabilia auctioneer Ingrid O'Neil in the United States.

"The auction went very well - as you can imagine I was quite surprised about the level of interest and the amount it sold for," O'Neil told insidethegames.

"It also made for an extremely happy consignor."

An Olympic gold medal won by Jesse Owens at Berlin 1936 sold for $1,466,574 last year ©Hulton Archive/Getty Images


The Stockholm 1956 Torch is second only to one from the Helsinki 1952 Games, which sold for €290,000 (£239,000/$403,000) at a Paris auction in 2011, in terms of Torch value, but an Olympic gold medal won by Jesse Owens at Berlin 1936 remains the record holder for the amount paid for an item of Olympic memorabilia.

That medal was sold to an anonymous bidder for $1,466,574 (£897,445/€1,070,056) last December.

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