Rafael Nadal was one of the most successful tennis players of his generation. At age 19, however, his career was seriously threatened by chronic midfoot pain. He chose to play on, adopting a highly unconventional – and potentially controversial – approach to pain management.

Painful feet have been observed, documented and treated for centuries. In this feature, Dr Thomas Collins explores how routine lower limb care was described in early modern England – and what these accounts reveal about the long and often invisible history of the profession.