The owner and chief executive of the Indianapolis Colts — who has a collection of guitars that were played by the likes of Bob Dylan, Jerry Garcia and Elvis Presley — added another on Thursday night, a 60-year-old electric guitar that some musicians say occupies an important place in guitar history.

The guitar sold for $335,500, far below some estimates, in an auction in Manhattan. The winning bid was placed by Christopher McKinney, who serves as guitar curator for Jim Irsay, the Colts’ owner. The auction was held by Guernsey’s at the Arader Galleries on Madison Avenue, near 78th Street.

The guitar, known as Black Beauty, originally belonged to Les Paul, a guitarist, inventor and inveterate tinkerer. He had experimented with electronic amplification in the 1930s and by 1941 had built a forerunner of Black Beauty. But not until the mid-1950s did he hit on a solid-body instrument for mass production that he was pleased with, and he understood how different it was.

“You’re changing from an apologetic instrument that could hardly be heard into a giant, where you could be the leader of the band,” he said in 2008.