Why Is The Audi Logo Four Rings?

If someone told you ‘name something with four rings’, we’d A) be wondering what sort of people you hang around with to have this conversation, B) suspect you might have to mentally count how many Olympic rings there are, and C) probably then shout ‘Audi'.

We’re very familiar with that logo now, be it on the face of Group B rally monsters, dominating Le Mans, across the back of the sublime R8 or in your mirrors as an A4 TDI tailgates you along the M40.

An icon in its own right, but Audi first started using the logo in 1932, despite being formed in 1909. Why? Well, story time…

The birth of Audi

We must go before the beginning of Audi, and to the establishment of car manufacturer Horch to explain this one.

In 1899, August Horch – a former employee of Karl Benz, the man who is credited with creating the first car – created A. Horch & Cie, which would build its first automobile in 1901. All was going OK for Horch through the first decade of the 1900s, until a fallout with the company’s chief financial officer led to the German leaving his own company.

In July 1909, he’d go on to establish the creatively-named August Horch Automobilwerke GmbH – something his original company was not too fond of. He was taken to court and prohibited from using his own name on his establishment.

Pondering ideas while over at his friend’s, Franz Fikentscher, the story goes that Horch was given the name Audi by Fikentscher’s son, who was doing Latin homework in the corner of the room. Horch in German translates to ‘hark’ in English, and ‘audi’ in Latin. Clever.

A quad merger

So, Audi would go on to be a success, officially named Audiwerke AG, and Horch himself would leave the business in 1920 to take up a government position.

In 1928, Danish businessman and owner of rival firm DKW Jørgen Rasmussen bought a majority stake of Audiwerke. Then 1932 came, and the two would be merged with another manufacturer, Wanderer and perhaps fittingly, Horch. Auto Union was born.

So, why the rings, and when did it become Audi again?

This one is pretty easy to explain. Each ring was designed to symbolise each of the four companies, rather than giving prominence to one brand name.

Auto Union would be more famous on a global level for its involvement in Grand Prix racing throughout the ‘30s, but the name would be used until 1958. Volkswagen bought the then-struggling company and opted to use Audi as a brand name.