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The abacus was a great invention in ancient China and has been called
by some Western writers "the earliest calculating machine in
the world."
The abacus has a long history behind it. It was already mentioned
in a book of the Eastern Han Dynasty, namely Supplementary Notes
on the Art of Figures written by Xu Yue about the year 190 A.
D. Its popularization occurred at the latest during the Song Dynasty
(960-1127), when Zhang Zeduan painted his Riverside Scenes at
Qingming Festival. In this famous long scroll, an abacus is clearly
seen lying beside an account book and doctor's prescriptions on
the counter of an apothecary's. During the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644),
the abacus was introduced into Japan.
Abacuses are easy to make, handy to carry around and quick to
give the answers, provided one knows how to move the beads. They
have been in use, therefore, down to this day. They are made in
different sizes, and the largest known abacus, measuring 26 centimetres
high by 306 centimetres long with 117 rods (for as many digits),
is over a hundred years old and is kept at Darentang, a well-known
traditional pharmacy in Tianjin.
The beads on an abacus may be round or rhombus in shape. Traditionally,
there are two beads above the horizontal bar and five below. Simplified
modern versions have one bead above and four or five below. The
methods of calculation remain unchanged.
At a time when the world has entered the age of electronics,
the abacus still enjoys undiminished vitality in China. Tests
have shown that, for operations of addition and subtraction, the
abacus is still faster than the electronic calculator. China developed
in 1980 an "electronic abacus " which combines the speed
of traditional addition and subtraction methods with those of
the modern calculator at multiplication and division. It is a
happy example of the integration between the East and West, the
native and the modern.
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