But the idea of lighting the torch at the ancient Olympian site in Greece and then running it through different countries has much darker origins.
It was invented in its modern form by the organisers of the 1936 Olympics in Berlin.
And it was planned with immense care by the Nazi leadership to project the image of the Third Reich as a modern, economically dynamic state with growing international influence.
The idea chimed perfectly with the Nazi belief that classical Greece was an Aryan forerunner of the modern German Reich.
And the event blended perfectly the perversion of history with publicity for contemporary German power.
BBC NEWS | Europe | The Olympic torch's shadowy past
The Third Reich also brought us Television...