Abstract
In 1907, James Ramsay Hunt (1) described a syndrome characterized by facial nerve paralysis associated with herpetic eruption of the pinna and suggested that herpes zoster oticus resulted from a geniculate ganglionitis. However, many contemporary authors agree that this condition represents a polycranial neuronitis and not simply a geniculate ganglionitis. Thus, it is a more complex disease, and the precise pathogenesis in the temporal bone that leads to facial palsy is not yet known.