A Galician helped make the metric system used worldwide. Spain abandoned him

Galician mathematician Pedro Xosé Rodríguez González played a key role in the geodetic work that helped define the modern meter.

Born in Lalín, he rose academically at the University of Santiago before moving to Paris to join the meridian-measurement expedition.

His work supported the measurement of the Paris meridian, but the Napoleonic-era wars cut the mission short and left him underrecognized.

While French scientists later gained wider fame, Rodríguez’s contribution was crucial to the origins of the metric system.