Early civilizations developed a variety of ways of representing and manipulating numerical quantities in addition to the use of written symbols. Systems based on counting fingers and sometimes toes were replaced by tokens with a variety of numerical...

The abacus is the most ancient calculating device known. It has endured over time and is still in use in some countries. An abacus consists of a wooden frame, rods, and beads. Each rod represents a different place value—ones, tens, hundreds,...

The abacus is a mechanical aid used to perform arithmetic calculations (sometimes called bead arithmetic). It is believed that the counting board, ancestor of the abacus, first appeared around 3000 B.C. as an arrangement of sand and pebbles and was...

The abacus is an ancient calculating machine. This simple apparatus is about 5,000 years old and is thought to have originated in Babylon. As the concepts of zero and Arabic number notation became widespread, basic math functions became simpler, and...

The abacus, an ancient calculating device, probably originated in Babylon around 2400 B. C. E. as a "counting box." It was the world's first calculator, and contemporary versions are still in use today. An abacus is a wooden or...

A manual computing device used in ancient China, the abacus (suan pan, or "counting plate") was probably invented there in ancient times. The word "abacus" has its roots in the Phoenician term for a flat surface, and its...

Although the exact time of its discovery is not truly known, the abacus is believed to have originated in the Middle East (in the region of modern-day Iraq) around 3000 B.C. Later, the abacus was used by the Hindus, and later still by the ancient...

calculating device, probably of Babylonian origin, that was long important in commerce. It is the ancestor of the modern calculating machine and computer. The earliest “abacus” likely was a board or slab on which a Babylonian spread sand so...

An abacus (plurals abacuses or abaci), also called a counting frame, is a calculating tool for performing arithmetic processes. Nowadays, abaci are often constructed as a wooden frame with beads sliding on wires, but originally they were beads or stones...