Notes and References:
[5] E.g., see Paul J. Nahin, Oliver Heaviside: Saqe in Solitude, IEEE Press, New York. Quoting from p. 9: "...nowhere in Maxwell's writings do the equations for the electromagnetic field appear as we write them today. Maxwell used an amalgamation of Cartesian component and quaternion notation, and it was Heaviside who first wrote the electromagnetic field equations in modern vector form." Quoting from p. 92: "In actuality , however, the fields were not the primary reality to Maxwell at all (that is an idea that developed after Maxwell's death and is due to Hertz and Heaviside), but rather it was Faraday's 'electrotonic state' that he thought to be the real thing. Like Faraday, Maxwell believed that electromagnetic effects are observable results of an altered state of the ether. The mathematical formulation of this electrotonic state, for Maxwell, is what we today (as he did) call the vector potential." And again, from p. 96: "To Maxwell, however, the vector potential had a most definite physical meaning."