Caspar Wessel

To survive, he became an assistant land surveyor to his brother and they worked on the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters' topographical survey of Denmark.

His fundamental paper, Om directionens analytiske betegning (On the Analytical Representation of Direction), was presented in 1797 to the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters.

[3]"It is now Norway's cause to do what should be done, that this strange Man's Memory may be brought forth by Oblivion and his Name find its proper place before the History of Mathematics."

The dissertation created a great uproar and resulted in a front-page article in Dagbladet and Sophus Lie taking action to raise awareness of Wessel.

In fact, Lie wrote in the article that "It is now Norway's cause to do what should be done, that this strange Man's Memory may be brought forth by Oblivion and his Name find its proper place before the History of Mathematics.

Even though this was not Wessel's main intention with the publication, he felt that a geometrical concept of numbers, with length and direction, was needed.

[11] Wessel had a modest and quiet personality, he was described by his brother Johan Herman as "He draws maps and reads the law.