Pain in the ear from causes other than suppurative disease of the ear or its immediate appendages is frequently difficult to classify accurately. True neuralgic pain in the ear is infrequently encountered as a major complaint. Reichert1 reported a case of tic douloureux of the ear, which he called tympanic plexus neuralgia. The patient, a young woman, had sharp, stabbing, excruciating pain deep in the external auditory canal, of such severity that she would cry out and cringe, holding her hand to her ear. The seventh, eighth and ninth nerves were exposed with the area under local anesthesia, and the pain could be reproduced only by stimulating the ninth nerve. For this reason the ninth, or glossopharyngeal, nerve was sectioned, and the patient was subsequently relieved of pain. We are reporting a similar case, in which a vascular lesion was present in the cerebollopontile angle. REPORT OF CASE A