There’s some debate about exactly who invented the grand touring coupé but very little about where, in national terms, it happened.
The popular response to the question of what the first and defining example was is the 1951 Lancia Aurelia B20 GT (extra credit if you reel off the whole lot in a mockney twang, like Paul Whitehouse in his grocer’s apron).
It could have been the 1948 Ferrari 166 Inter, though, or the 1947 Maserati A6 – or something pre-war, even. Wherever the credit eventually comes to rest, however, the gran turismo was definitely given life and then popularised in Italy.
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