• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.49-66
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• 2005

We briefly survey the history of abacus and counting rods which had been most widespread devices for arithmetical calculations. And we explain and compare the methods and principles of calculation on the abacus and counting rods. Only multiplication and division are presented here with examples. In these course we can see that the principles of calculation on the abacus are inherited from that of calculation on the counting rods. We also discuss the educational value of the abacus.