From my understanding (and I well could be wrong here), Europeans inherited from Greek a mathematics system that favored geometry and tended to abhor algebra. Concepts like integers, rationals, and irrational numbers are all pretty easy to explore and explain with geometry. By contrast, zero, negative numbers, and imaginary numbers create absurdities in geometry (how can a line have length 0? -2? 3 + 4i?). Moreover, even as algebra is introduced to Europeans via the Arabs, I can see people resisting algebra in part because it introduces these absurdities and paradoxes that need explanation.
As far as I can tell from the historical record (and it doesn't help that modern histories tends to describe historical mathematical discoveries in modern terms, meaning it's difficult to work out as a lay person in what terms the historical discoverer understood their own work), it looks like the acceptance of zero, negative numbers, and complex numbers are more or less concurrent, and this also seems to coincide with the shift in mathematics from being predominantly geometric to algebraic.
As far as I can tell from the historical record (and it doesn't help that modern histories tends to describe historical mathematical discoveries in modern terms, meaning it's difficult to work out as a lay person in what terms the historical discoverer understood their own work), it looks like the acceptance of zero, negative numbers, and complex numbers are more or less concurrent, and this also seems to coincide with the shift in mathematics from being predominantly geometric to algebraic.