A Journey to the Birth of the Automobile Every car on the road today – from compact city cars and luxury saloons to Formula 1 racers and electric hypercars – owes its existence to one remarkable invention. Long before automotive giants such as Ferrari, Porsche, Mercedes-Benz or Toyota became household names, a visionary German engineer introduced a machine that would change transportation forever. That machine was the Benz Patent-Motorwagen. Officially patented on 29 January 1886, it is widely recognised as the world’s first true automobile powered by an internal combustion engine. Unlike earlier experiments that simply added engines to horse-drawn carriages, Carl Benz designed the Patent-Motorwagen as a complete vehicle…