The reflexive relationship between areas of the ear with certain regions of the body (for example internal organs, limbs, brain centers) has been investigated by the French physician Paul Nogier around 1950. He was the first to puplish the projection of the Homunculus (imagine a embryo upside down in its curled up possition) and a classification of the pinna. Nogier’s examination results were even recognized in China where there already existed an own variation of ear acupuncture.
About 200 BC in China, in ‘Huangdi Neijing’ (Book of Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine), 20 acupuncture points were mentioned on the pinna for the first time. Thus, there are two types of ear acupuncture, the Chinese and the French after Nogier .
However, even in Persia and in ancient Egypt some individual ear acupuncture points were used and Hippocrates knew single reactive points on the pinna.