CHINESE ABACUS

Introduction
Abacus (also known as Suanpan in Chinese meaning counting tray) is a
calculating and numerical recording tool. The earliest known written
documentation of Chinese Abacus dates back to 2nd century BC. Possible
origin of Abacus could be Chinese counting rods, which operated with
Decimal system lacking concept of zero. Up until calculators and teller
machines became so cheap, they were widely used.
Composition
Most common type of Chinese Abacus has 13 vertical wires, with 7 beads on
each wire. The wires and beads are in rectangular frame. The beads are
usually rounded and made of hardwood. There is a horizontal divider within
frame, so 7 beads on each wire are separated into 2 beads above the divider
(Heavenly beads) and 5 beads below the divider (Earthly beads). The 2
Heavenly beads represent five units and 5 Earthly beads represent one unit.
Chinese abacuses are designed to allow for hexadecimal computation. Each
rod has a decimal value: the first, ones; the second, tens; the third,
hundreds; and etc.
Mechanism
If a bead is positioned next to central division or towards it, it means its
value is activated. Example- If you want to record a number 8, move one of
Heavenly and three of Earthly beads towards the divider. The Suanpan can
be reset to the starting position instantly by a quick movement along the
horizontal axis to spin all the beads away from the horizontal beam at the
center. Efficient Suanpan techniques have been developed to
do multiplication, division, addition, subtraction, square root and cube
root operations at high speed. These operations are explained below with
help of examples -

Addition Operation (13+4) -> First, move one Earthly bead in

tens column and three Earthly beads in Ones column towards divider
resulting into value Thirteen. To add four to it, start adding beads to
Ones column. We can exchange 5 Earthly beads with 1 heavenly
beads. Final result would be one Earthly bead in Tens column and one
Heavenly & two Earthly beads in Ones column.
 Subtraction Operation (14-5) -> First, move one Earthly bead
in tens column and four Earthly beads in Ones column towards divider
resulting into value Fourteen. We cannot subtract 5 from 4, so we will
borrow one unit from Tens place (leaving it zero) and subtract five
from fourteen. Final result would be nine. Similarly, all other addition
and subtraction operations can be executed easily.

Multiplication operation (5*4) -> Multiplication is nothing

more than a series of additions. First, start moving Heavenly beads in
Ones column towards divider to activate them. After two such beads,
we can carry to add one Earthly bead in Tens column. Similarly, after
adding two beads in Ones place, we will carry one more bead resulting
in two beads in Earthly beads in Tens place column.

Division Operation (642) -> 64 is the dividend, 2 is the

divisor, and 32 is the quotient. Basically division is done by dividing a
single digit into one or possibly two digits at a time. You're required to
multiply after each division step and do subtraction to get the
remainder. The remainder is then tacked on to the rest of the dividend
and the division is continued in this way until its completed. Divide 6
of dividend with 2 and set the quotient 3. Multiply quotient 3 with
divisor 2 to obtain 6. Subtract the product of 6 with dividend to obtain
remainder. Divide 4 with 2 of divisor and set quotient 2. Multiply the
quotient 3 with divisor 2 and subtract the product from 4 of dividend
to obtain remainder (which is zero).

Suanpan arithmetic was still being taught in school in Hong Kong as recently
as the late 1960s, and in China into the 1990s. In China, formerly
accountants and financial personnel had to pass certain graded examinations
in bead arithmetic before they were qualified. Starting from about 2002 or
2004, this requirement has been entirely replaced by computer accounting.