Die prägenden Jahre im Leben von Karl Weierstraß

Abstract

This essay deals with the first 40 years, the formative years in the life of the renowned mathematician Karl Weierstraß (1815–1897) beginning with his family background and school education. We describe his studies in Bonn and Münster and his activities as a secondary school teacher in some out-of-the-way places in the former state of Prussia. There, despite his isolation and lack of access to mathematical research literature he single-mindedly succeeded with the solution of a crucial case of the so-called Jacobi inversion problem for Abelian integrals. This sensational success earned him an honorary doctor’s degree from the University of Königsberg, and he was soon appointed to a professorship in Berlin where he began a second life as one of the greatest analysts of all time.