Re first paragraph: Do you think mathematics and physics are different? It isn't like the old papers are relevant after hundreds of years, others have written the same things in more distilled and easier to read formats.
Well, most students in (contemporary) math programs don't learn to derive their axioms from Euclid (construction of naturals are usually done via Peano), their Calculus from Newton's Principia, and nor do they learn their set theory from Cantor's original papers. Instead they learn from modern textbooks that make only a passing reference to the original authors.
Yeah, that was my point. I wondered what your point was.