The retired Formula One driver Jean Alesi, who chauffeured Ecclestone and his daughter to the ceremony in a vintage car, presumably also gave his services gratis.
According to Ecclestone's testimony, the event actually cost £12 million, a sum he learned about only when informed by his ex-wife, Slavica Radic, who had paid the bill out of the offshore trust, Bambino Holdings, set up several years earlier with several billion pounds of the money he had earned from exploiting the commercial rights to Formula One.
He was, he made it clear, furious at the extravagance. Those bottles of Petrus were apparently just part of a £800,000 drinks tab.
"When it was suggested how much we were going to spend on drinks, I thought it was absurd and I managed to upset my daughter and my wife, and then she (Slavica) spent in excess of £12 million."
Ecclestone's statement came in support of his claim that he had no control over Bambino Holdings, which was registered in the name of Slavica, whom he married in 1985 and from whom, after almost a quarter of a century of reputedly stormy cohabitation, he was divorced two years ago at a reputed cost of £750 million.
It was an extraordinary admission from a man who has spent almost 30 years exerting total control over one of the world's richest sports.
But it was necessary in order for him to explain why, six years ago, he paid the sum of US$44 million ($57 million) to the man in the dock: Gerhard Gribkowsky, an employee of the state-owned BayernLB bank, who helped sell the bank's $839 million stake in F1 to a private equity company.
Prosecutors claim the money was a bribe to ensure Ecclestone remained in control of the sport. Denying the suggestion, Ecclestone said it had been paid to prevent Gribkowsky contacting Britain's tax officials with the allegation that he had retained control over the funds in Bambino Holdings, something which would have rendered him liable to a tax bill amounting, in his own estimation, "in excess of £2 billion".
Gribkowsky had been "shaking him down. He would have landed me with a lengthy investigation and huge legal costs. I didn't need it and so I paid to get rid of the problem."
Why, he was asked, had he preferred to pay the US$44 million rather than go to the police? "It was one of those things in life that you want to forget about," he replied.
A man who has lived on his wits and his negotiating prowess since his school days, when he bought buns with the money from two paper rounds and sold them at a profit to his fellow pupils, Ecclestone seldom admits weakness and then only when it serves his purpose.
Like his occasional displays of vagueness, his sometimes barely audible whisper and an ability to turn his own opinions upside down faster than an F1 car can accelerate from 0-60, it is part of a highly sophisticated technique that enabled him to take over an entire sport and bend it to his will, while beguiling presidents, prime ministers, sheikhs and kings into becoming part of his show - at a considerable price.
Last weekend, Ecclestone was in Abu Dhabi, where a grand prix was raced on the Yas Marina circuit, a spectacular venue costing hundreds of millions of pounds. It is one of the tracks built at his behest in places such as China, Bahrain, Turkey, South Korea and Malaysia, as part of Formula One's expansion away from the traditional tracks in Europe - a continent Ecclestone considers to be finished as an economic power - and into the world's emerging markets.
Last month in New Delhi, the circus pitched its tent for the first Indian Grand Prix, drawing a capacity crowd on race day. Soon, there will be a race in Sochi, the Black Sea resort, as a result of a 15-minute meeting last year between Ecclestone and Vladimir Putin, who endorsed a deal that will see the Russian Government paying Ecclestone's organisation US$280 million over seven years for the privilege of holding a race as part of the championship series.
Ecclestone's relationships with politicians have not always been smooth.
In 1997, after deciding that New Labour was likely to take power, he made a secret £1 million donation to Tony Blair's election fund.
A new dual carriageway was duly built to link Silverstone, home of the British Grand Prix, to the nearest motorways, and government minister Tessa Jowell argued in Brussels for the exemption of Formula One, then heavily dependent on cigarette company money, from the EU's ban on tobacco advertising and sponsorship.
The revelation of the loan led to Labour returning the money and Blair apologising for mishandling the affair.
Typically, Ecclestone was untouched by the scandal, as he would be when his old friend Max Mosley's private life was exposed by the News of the World in 2008.
The two had worked together to wrest the control of F1 away from the old amateur governing body, exploiting its commercial rights to transform grand prix racing, in the words of Ecclestone's biographer Tom Bower, "from a mere enthusiasts' sport into one of the world's most watched entertainments".
Now, however, he is facing a challenge to his authority, created by the expiry next year of his deal with the 12 Formula One teams. Long dissatisfied with the share of the cake allowed them, the teams are threatening to form a breakaway series - something that would potentially render ownership of the commercial rights, in which a majority stake is held by the private equity firm CVC Capital Partners, valueless.
It is the sort of problem he has always overcome, with the aid of sudden unexpected alliances. Most of the participants agree that, even at 81, he's the best man to run the show.
Meanwhile in the second episode of Tamara Ecclestone: Billion $$ Girl last week viewers were able to see the daughter's 100 pairs of Christian Louboutin shoes and her $10,000 collection of Hermes handbags; to meet her boyfriend, a 37-year-old stockbroker in distressed jeans named Omar Khyami; and to hear about the £56 million London house her father bought her, in which she plans to install a £1 million crystal bath. Outside, her Ferrari sat on the turntable installed to save her the bother of reversing in the driveway. "Uh-MAYY-zung," she kept saying. "Uh-MAYY-zung." Indeed.
Wheel-man Bernie Ecclestone
Born
In Ipswich, England, in 1930. He left school at 16 to race motorbikes and began buying and selling motorcycle parts, building up a business that became one of the country's biggest motorcycle dealerships.
Best of times
In 1957, Ecclestone bought the Connaught Formula One team, becoming a founder of the Formula One Constructors Association in 1974 and, seven years later, winning the right to negotiate TV contracts.
Worst of times
His "biggest mistake" was setting up a family trust to control his shares in the Formula One group. The trust sold his shares for a huge sum, but private equity group CVC now have majority control of F1. In 2010, Ecclestone was beaten by muggers outside his London home.
He says
"I doubt if any successful business person works for money. For most people who are reasonably successful it's a way of keeping score. Money is a by-product of success. It's not the main aim."
They say
"Bernie has always been a racer - he loves the sport. And he has been able to make it a huge commercial success by promoting the sort of racing he himself likes. He understands what the fans want because he wants it too."
- Former president of the F1 Max Mosley
- OBSERVER
