Some eight months after the Queen placed her "address" in the Rennie Mackintosh inspired baton at Buckingham Palace it has at last reached Scotland to signal that Glasgow 2014 is nearly here.

The Queen's baton relay - or QBR in shorthand - has become the biggest event of its kind in world sport. Whereas the journey of the Olympic Torch has been scaled down to a domestic affair which passes through Greece and that year's host nation, the QBR rejoices in visiting every single Commonwealth territory.

This year is the third time that a Scottish city has hosted the Commonwealth Games but the sixth occasion that Glasgow has been visited by the Baton .In fact, even this 2014 incarnation will be returning to Scottish soil. Back in October, as organisers launched the appeal to find runners to carry it through the Highlands, it was taken to  Stirling University. Swimmer Ross Murdoch and triathlete Marc Austin seized their chance to hold it .

The Queen's Baton Relay for Glasgow 2014 has already made a brief stopover in Scotland when it visited Stirling University ©Glasgow 2014

In 1970. Edinburgh was the stage for  what were then known as  the British Commonwealth Games. Organisers had decided that "the Baton containing the message should be carried around as large a part of Scotland as practicable during the week preceding the Games. Thus many distant places from Edinburgh would feel they were playing some part in Scotland's Games."

A competition was held by the Royal College of Art. Hector Miller was the winner and executed his design in silver gilt. Two Batons were made and were the gift of the Worshipful company of Goldsmiths.

The Relay that year had begun in Yellowknife in Canada's Northwest Territory. It is the only time to date that the  it has ever started its journey outside England. It landed at Prestwick Airport where Games organising Chairman Sir Herbert Brechin was waiting to greet it. The first Scottish runner was 21-year-old John Ferguson who began the 700 mile journey around Scotland with an escort of fellow members of Ayr Seaforth Harriers in their distinctive club running vests. They were one of 18 organisations who participated. Unlike earlier Relays it took place exclusively in the hours of daylight.

The runners headed to the Borders and then to Glasgow where 14-year-old Doreen Arthur of City of Glasgow Ladies AC and four escort runners arrived to present it to the Lord Provost Donald Liddle. In turn, he handed it to representatives of the Glasgow Union of Youth Clubs to continue the journey.

It headed North towards Aberdeen and, although the organisers had hoped it would cause a stir, The Scotsman noted that in Aberdeen it had "passed unheralded and almost unnoticed" when it was received by from 16-year-old Yvonne Valentine by Lord Provost James Lamond.

Commonwealth Games marathon champion Jim Alder was the final person to carry the Queen's Baton Relay at the Opening Ceremony of Edinburgh 1970
©Hulton Archive/Getty Images

It was a different story when the Baton finally reached Edinburgh and at the Meadowbank Stadium.

Marathon runner Jim Alder had been selected as the final bearer. He had won gold at the 1966 Games in Kingston, despite a mistake by officials who misdirected him outside the stadium .He made light of the extra distance  to win the race and had no problems with a much shorter run on a new synthetic track to deliver the baton in 1970. Prince Philip read the message from The Queen, who later attended the Games in person for the first time.

When the Games returned to Edinburgh 16 years later, there was a certain symmetry when the Baton crossed the border into Scotland. This time Alder, who had turned 46 the previous week, walked at a much more sedate pace with the baton through an avenue of flags representing the Commonwealth countries, though sadly, many  stayed away from the Games themselves in a boycott over rugby contacts with South Africa.

The Relay through Scotland over the next nine days was sponsored was organised by Sir James Orr in conjunction with 52 Lowland Brigade, based at Edinburgh Castle. Organisers insisted "the accent was on youth" and many runners and cyclists took part. The Baton also visited the rowing venue at Strathclyde.

It was sponsored for the first time. The Royal Mail's Datapost service had transported the baton around the British Isles.

Sprinter Allan Wells was chosen to bring the baton into the stadium. A Commonwealth gold medallist at Edmonton 1978 and Brisbane 1982, he had been a volunteer helper at the Meadowbank Stadium in 1970. Wells was flanked by six champions from those Games, athletes Lachie Stewart, Rosemary Stirling, Rosemary Payne, Ian Stewart, boxer Tom Imrie and fencer Sandy Leckie.

Again it fell to Prince Philip to read the message,  the final time he would do so as President of the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF).

In the new Millennium, the Baton Relay has returned to the Highlands on three occasions.

David Beckham carried the Queen's Baton Relay into the City of Manchester Stadium at the 2002 Commonwealth Games ©AFP/Getty Images

In 2002,Manchester in the North West of England were to stage the  Games They decided a wide ranging event would help in "securing the involvement of people across Britain, engaging them in the spirit of the Manchester 2002 Commonwealth Games".

All the nations and regions were involved and Scotland was allocated five days in the Relay with Stranraer as the first port of call.

Earlier in the year Great Britain had won Olympic gold in curling at Salt Lake City. Every member of the team was Scottish. Janice Rankin, Fiona Macdonald and alternate Margaret Morton invited to take part in the Relay .Hammy McMillan, skip of the men's team and a former world champion, also carried the Baton.

When the Relay reached Glasgow, hammer thrower Chris Black who had won bronze for Scotland at the  1982 Brisbane Games, Edinburgh 1970 high jump medallist Moira Maguire and Paralympian swimmer Maggie McEnely showed the Baton to crowds watching the Scottish trials at Scotstoun Stadium.

Athlete Kirsty Law carried it from Urquart Castle to Loch Ness, where Adrian Shine of the Deepscan Loch Ness project lowered it 220 metres into the dark and mysterious waters.

This was an echo of the Sydney Olympics in 2000. Then, the Torch had been taken underwater at the Great Barrier Reef. Sadly, although the 2002 baton was capable of recording heartbeats, it found no evidence of a monster lurking in the depths.

Sir Peter Heatly, long-serving chairman of the CGF, and himself a three-time diving gold medallist, took the baton in Aberdeen.

Willie Shanks, an 87-year-old stalwart of the local society to promote the work of the great Scottish poet Robbie Burns, carried the baton from the Bannockburn Memorial.

The journey to the 2006 Melbourne Games began fully a year before their Games. For the first time it visited every territory in the Commonwealth. When it stopped in Glasgow,it visited some of the arenas which will see service next month. Lee McConnell, a silver medallist over 400 metres in 2002, took it around the perimeter at Hampden Park. It also made a stop at the Tollcross swimming venue .

The city had already been chosen as the venue for 2014 by the time that the Relay to Delhi began in November 2009. Yvonne Murray, 10,000m gold medallist at the 1994 Games in Victoria, took the baton at Glasgow's Kelvin Grove Museum during another brief visit to the city.

Five-time Olympic cycling gold medallist Sir Chris Hoy carried the Queen's Baton Relay for Glasgow 2014 when it was launched in London last October ©Getty Images

Over the next month, the speculation over the identity of the final bearer will reach fever pitch. The regulations used to specify "the runner carrying the baton into the stadium should be a medallist from the host country of a previous Games".

That rule has been relaxed since 1990 as organisers looked for more unorthodox choices. Eventer Mark Todd arrived on his famous horse Charisma at the Auckland opening. Four years later in Victoria, biathlete Myriam Bedard was another Olympic, rather than Commonwealth champion, when she arrived on dry land skis with the 1994 baton. At Manchester in 2002 David Beckham delighted the crowds in Manchester when he appeared in the Stadium.

Glasgow's organisers might well pick up the football theme. The Games open at Celtic Park, home of the fabled "Lisbon Lions" who lifted the European Cup in 1967. Billy McNeill was their captain that golden afternoon and as a club ambassador could well figure, but this being Glasgow, the other Old Firm Club, Rangers would also have to be recognised. John Greig skippered them to the European Cup winners' Cup in 1972. Could there also be a place for Kenny Dalglish, still the only Scottish footballer to win 100 caps, or rugby union's Sir Ian McGeechan, an outstanding British Lions player and coach?.

Since 2002, the trend has been to have more than one runner carry the baton in the stadium  so reigning Wimbledon champion Andy Murray must also be in with a great chance. Scotland's greatest Olympian. Sir Chris Hoy seems certain to play his part. Resplendent in kilt, he walked up the Mall to show the Baton to the world at the very start of this Relay. For him to end it too would be the ultimate in symmetry.

Philip Barker has worked as a television journalist for 25 years. He began his career with Trans World Sport, then as a reporter for Skysports News and the ITV breakfast programme. A regular Olympic pundit on BBC Radio, Sky News and Talksport, he is associate editor of the Journal of Olympic History, has lectured at the National Olympic Academy and contributed extensively to Team GB publications. His latest book, Lord's First: 200 Years of Making History at Lord's Cricket Ground, has recently been published. To follow him on Twitter click here.