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Spain accompanied by 8 Spanish volunteers. Once there, after crossing the whole
country, it reached the Barcelona Stadium where a disabled athlete lit the altar by
shooting an arrow on whose tip the Olympic Flame was burning.
Chapter E
The lighting ceremony and the flame relay at the modern winter Olympic
Games
The lighting of the Olympic Flame for the Winter Olympics officially started in
1964 for the Innsbruck Games in Austria.
Both the ceremony and the relay are different from those we have for the summer
Games.
In 1952, for the Oslo Games, the Organizing Committee took a flame from the
fireplace of the house of the man who had invented skis; he is called Morgenthal
and he gave his name to his village located in the centre of Norway. Morenthal's
flame was called Olympic without any reaction on the part of the IOC nor, probably,
of Greece.
In 1956, for the Games at Cortina d'Ampezzo, the Italian organizers took a
flame from the Capitol. They called it Olympic and carried it by flame relay to the
site of the Games. There was a lot of publicity around the term "Olympic" as they
had borrowed a small tripod altar from Greece.
Since 1964, however, the Flame has been lit in the traditional manner in the Sacred
Altis and the temple of Hera and then carried by the priestesses to the hill,
close to Pierre de Coubertin's monument. From there they descend in procession
through the trees and light the altar of the monument. Then the high priestess
hands the Flame to the first runner and it is carried by flame relay to the next village
"Platanos". From there it is taken by car to the military airport in Andravida
and flown to Athens. From Athens airport the Flame is then carried by flame relay
to the Panathenean Stadium where it is delivered to the organizers during a special
ceremony.
There have been two exceptions to this programme: the flame relay of the Albertville
Games in 1992 where, after the lighting ceremony, the Flame was carried
by car directly to Athens airport where it was handed over to the organizers and,
in 1994, for the Lillehammer Games in Norway, where the Flame was handed over
in Olympia right after the ceremony. Before the lighting there had been an incident
because the Norwegians, probably remembering 1952, wanted to light Morgenthal's
flame which they called Olympic and which they would carry by flame
relay throughout Norway; when it reached Oslo the "Greek flame" as they called
it would be there too and the two flames together would light one altar.
We of course did not agree with the Norwegians who could not understand the
reasons for our disagreement. Finally and after a lot of pressure from the Norwegian
ambassador in Athens, they realized that their proposal was not right and so
they did have a relay across Norway with Morgenthal's flame, which is certainly
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