New York (AFP)
The original manuscript of the Olympic Games manifesto written in 1892 by Pierre de Coubertin was sold for $ 8.8 million on Wednesday at auctions organized by Sotheby's in New York, a record for an object linked to sport.
The document reached nearly nine times the high estimate, at a million dollars, during a sale of books and manuscripts.
Written in French, it includes 14 pages in which Baron de Coubertin outlines his vision for reviving the Olympic Games in Antiquity in the form of a modern and international sports competition.
It is the only known copy of this text which served as the basis for a speech delivered in Paris on November 25, 1892 on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of the Union of French Athletic Sports Societies.
Two years after this speech, Pierre de Coubertin founded the International Olympic Committee in 1894, a prelude to the first Olympic Games of the modern era to be held in Athens in 1896.
The document disappeared for several decades after the death of Pierre de Coubertin in 1937.
In the early 90s, François d'Amat, passionate about Pierre de Coubertin, found traces of it in Switzerland, where a collector kept it in a trunk.
The price offered for the manuscript overshadowed the $ 5.6 million paid last June for a jersey worn by the American baseball player Babe Ruth, during a sale organized by the house of Hunt Auctions.
© 2019 AFP