Suanpan

Chinese Reckoning Aid

from 2000 B.C.

This Chinese abacus with red lacquered beads has 13 digits.

This Suanpan shows the classical division into 5 single beads below the horizontal Centre bar and 2 five-beads above.

The right bar stands for the ones digit, the bar to the left for the tens, the next bar to the left for the hundreds and so on.

If required, the calculator can also define a higher digit for its calculation as the ones digit, in order to be able to calculate decimal places as well.

By clever bundling and unbundling, all four basic arithmetic operations can be solved very quickly with the Suanpan.