HISTORY OF REFLEXOLOGY

Working the hands and feet to aid heeling of the body is an ancient art. The earliest evidence of this was found in the tomb of Ankhmahor at Saqqara in Egypt, which dates back to approximately 2330 BCE. But it wasn't only the Egyptians, the ancient Chinese also worked the hands and feet to help prevent disease, and in India, foot massage plays a significant role in Ayurvedic medicine dating back approximately 5000 years. Along with Egypt, China and India, Native American and African tribes used hand and foot massage to promote good health, passing their knowledge down the generations through oral traditions. 
Much later during the 16th century the zone theory started to emerge with two Doctors, Dr Adamus and Dr Atatis describing their theory that the body can be divided into zones. They suggested that an imbalance in one zone can be addressed through working a different part of the same zone. Little did they know that this theory was to become the basis of reflexology.
Then, in the 1890's Sir Henry Head, an English neurologist, discovered that certain "zones" on the skin reflected the state of certain internal organs, if pain or sensitivity was felt in a specific "skin zone" the illness would be found in the correlating organ. Head also discovered that massage, heat or injections into that zone had a positive effect on the internal organ.
Following Head's discovery of this theory an American Dr William Fitzgerald founded zone therapy as we know it today. He divided the body into ten zones and claimed to alleviate pain in one area of a zone by applying pressure to another area of the same zone, mainly on the hand. He was even able to perform minor operations without the use of anaesthetics using this technique. Doing this he also realised that not only did this technique anaesthetise the corresponding area it removed the cause of the pain therefore, healing the patient.
Dr Fitzgerald's and his colleague, Dr Edwin Bowers worked closely on developing the ten zone theory, and became, the forefathers of modern reflexology. 
Dr Joseph Shelby Riley and his wife Elizabeth used the zone theory in their practice and developed it even further. They worked with a physiotherapist called Eunice Ingham and it was Eunice Ingham who in the 1930's, finally went on to discover that reflexes on the feet correspond to the organs in the body and application of different pressures on these reflexes, resulted in a positive effect on the organs. She then developed a foot map showing the entire body on the feet, resulting in reflexology as we know it today. Hurrah!! for Eunice Ingham.