Higher-order saddle test

Suppose a function near a critical point has Taylor expansion $f(p+h)=f(p)+P_m(h)+o(\Vert h{\Vert }^m)$, where $P_m$ is its first nonzero homogeneous polynomial term. If $P_m$ takes both positive and negative values on directions, then $p$ is a saddle point of a scalar function. Indeed, on rays $h=rv$ the leading term is $r^m{P}_m(v)$; for each chosen direction its sign dominates the remainder for small positive $r$. This works even when the Hessian matrix is zero. For example, $P_4(\xi ,\eta )=-{\xi }^3(\xi +\eta )$ is negative on $(1,0)$ and positive on $(1,-2)$, hence detects a saddle despite having degree four.