The article gives an overview of the historical development of stapedectomy beginning with Kessel in 1876. Then, from the beginning to the middle of the 20th century, surgery on the oval window became obsolete, opening the way for an era of fenestration operations until Shea in 1956 performed the first modern stapedectomy using a Teflon stapes replacement prosthesis. Since then, numerous surgeons worldwide have used this procedure with great success. Many of them have contributed towards progressively refining the surgical techniques, e.g. by changing the total removal of the footplate for the less traumatic small fenestra stapedectomy or stapedotomy.