ATHENS, Greece (Reuter) - The Olympic flame, symbol of peace and life, was handed over by Greece to Atlanta Friday and began its trip to the United States where it will open the summer Olympic Games on July 19.

In a ceremony at the marble Panathenean Stadium in Athens where the Olympics were revived in 1896, the flame was handed in a miner's lamp to William Payne, president of the Atlanta Olympics Organizing Committee, after a month's relay throughout Greece.

``Thank you for entrusting us once more with your sacred flame,'' Payne said in a speech after receiving the flame from Greek Olympic Committee President Antonis Tzikas.

``It is a singular honor for us to be tonight in Athens, in this glorius stadium to receive the flame,''

The flame was lit from the sun's rays on March 30 in the western pagan sanctuary of Ancient Olympia where the Olympics had their roots in 776 BC.

It covered a distance of 1,550 miles through Greece by 800 relay runners, and another circuitous relay starts Saturday from Los Angeles to Atlanta by more than 10,000 runners, covering a distance of almost 15,000 miles through 42 states.

Since the Berlin games in 1936, a flame lit in Ancient Olympia has opened the games to underscore the continuation of the ideals of the ancient Greeks in the modern Olympics.

In ancient Greece, runners would leave Olympia and crisscross the land to announce the start of the Ekecheiria -- the sacred truce which ended any fighting among city states while the Games were held.

The torch ceremony took on special significance this year, centennial celebration of the first modern games in Athens in 1896.

The Atlanta games torch, made of gold-plated brass and Georgia pecan wood, has a gathering of 22 aluminum reeds flared at the top to symbolize all the past summer Games

More than 10,000 copies of the torch, one for each of the U.S. relay athletes, have been produced and partipants can buy the torch they carry for $300.

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