The 1956 Cortina Olympic torch up for auction

On January 30, 2026, Cambi Casa d’Aste will launch a special timed auction dedicated to a unique, exceptional lot: a rare original Olympic torch from the VII Olympic Winter Games in Cortina d’Ampezzo in 1956.

The auction will end on February 6, 2026, at 8:00 p.m., at a highly symbolic moment, coinciding with the Opening Ceremony of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games, creating an ideal bridge between two Italian Olympic editions seventy years apart.

An icon of post-war Olympic design

The torch offered at auction is an original aluminum alloy model, 41.2 cm high and with a diameter of 14.4 cm, designed by Ralph Lavers, a central figure in Olympic design in the post-war period.

Produced by E.M.I. Factories Ltd and High Duty Alloys Ltd, the torch is based on the model introduced for the 1948 London Olympics, which was subsequently adopted for Melbourne and Stockholm in 1956.

The body bears the inscription in relief:

“CORTINA 1956 – VII WINTER OLYMPIC GAMES”

and is mounted on an original wooden base with a plaque dated June 17, 1956, an element that contributes significantly to its authenticity and the historical reconstruction of its provenance.

A direct and documented provenance

What makes this lot particularly significant is its direct and perfectly documented provenance.

The first owner was Nicola Manganaro, head of telephone services during the 1956 Olympics in Cortina, a position of utmost importance at a time when communications were the only real link between the Ampezzo valley and the rest of the world.

At the end of the Games, his colleagues decided to give him the torch as a token of gratitude and a tangible reminder of a unique professional and human experience. It was a spontaneous gesture, reflecting a time when Olympic objects were not created as collectible memorabilia, but as living testimonies, destined to become part of the everyday lives of those who had contributed to the success of the event.

From Nicola Manganaro’s home, the torch then proudly passed to his nephew Ferdinando Mezzelani, an accomplished sports photographer who, during his career, would cover eleven editions of the Olympic Games, naturally intertwining his life with the five rings.

The most memorable relay in Olympic history

The Cortina 1956 torch also witnessed a relay destined to become legendary.

Unlike the modern tradition, the Olympic flame was not lit in Olympia, Greece, but in Rome, on the steps of the Capitoline Temple of Jupiter, on January 22, 1956.

From there, it began a fascinating and complex journey:

by car to Ciampino, by plane to Venice, by gondola along the Grand Canal, then on foot, on skates and finally on skis to Cortina d’Ampezzo.

On January 26, 1956, the day of the Opening Ceremony, the flame reached the Ice Stadium thanks to a relay team made up of great Italian athletes, including Adolfo Consolini, Zeno Colò, Severino Menardi, and Enrico Colli, up to the last torchbearer, speed skater Guido Caroli.

In front of the audience and the first television cameras in the history of the Winter Games, Caroli tripped over the live broadcast cables but managed not to extinguish the flame, lighting the Olympic cauldron as planned. It was an imperfect moment, and for this very reason, an unforgettable one: the 1956 Games in Cortina were the first Winter Olympics to be broadcast internationally on television, as well as marking the debut of Soviet athletes.

A very rare item

The exact number of torches produced in 1956 is not reported in official sources. Unlike modern relays, each torch was reused several times along the route.

By comparison, for the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne—which used the exact same design—approximately 110 copies were made, suggesting an equally limited production for Cortina.

The extreme rarity of these objects, combined with their sporadic appearance on the international market, makes the torch presented here a lot of absolute museum and collector’s value.

The Olympic scepter

The symbolic value of the work is completed by the autobiographical account of Ferdinando Mezzelani, who as a child mistook that torch for a royal scepter in his grandmother’s house in Cortina.

Not just any scepter, but—as he would understand as he grew up—the symbol of another royalty: the Olympic one.

A solid, heavy object, far removed from contemporary designer torches, which spans generations, professions, and destinies, reemerging today as an authentic fragment of Italian and Olympic history.

Auction information

The auction will take place in timed mode, from January 30 to February 6, 2026, at 8:00 p.m., and will be accessible online to allow remote participation.

The complete lot description, with high-resolution images and a detailed description, can be viewed on the Cambi Casa d’Aste website.

The lot can also be viewed in person at the Milan office, located at Via San Marco 22.

For further information, please contact the team of experts by writing to milano@cambiaste.com.

With this special auction, Cambi Casa d’Aste celebrates not only an extraordinary object, but also the historical, human, and symbolic value it embodies, at a time when the Olympic flame is preparing to light up the Italian mountains once again.