At which Summer Olympics was the modern Olympic torch relay first held?

The modern Olympic torch relay was first held at the Berlin 1936 Summer Olympics.

The relay carried a flame from Olympia in Greece to Berlin, linking the ancient Olympic tradition with the modern Games. It began on July 20, 1936, and involved more than 3,000 runners across several countries before the flame reached the Olympic Stadium.

The concept was proposed by Carl Diem and embraced by the organizers of the Berlin Games. Although ancient Greek festivals used sacred fires, the continuous international relay itself was not an ancient Olympic practice. It was therefore a modern ceremonial invention rather than a revived event in its original form.

The Olympic flame and torch relay are often treated as one tradition, but the flame had appeared at the 1928 Amsterdam Games and the 1932 Los Angeles Games without an international relay. The Berlin ceremony established the format later Games adapted.