| Roman Abacus |
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| roman mathematics | |
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The Romans developed the Roman abacus, an advancement over previous Greek Counting Boards . It was the first portable calculating device for engineers, merchants and presumably tax collectors. It greatly reduced the time needed to perform the basic operations of Roman Arithmetic using Roman Numerals . LAYOUT The Late Roman abacus shown here as a reconstruction contains seven longer and seven shorter grooves used for whole number counting, the former having up to four beads in each, and the latter having just one. The rightmost two groves were for fractional counting. The abacus was made of a metal plate where the beads ran in slots. The size was such that it could fit in a modern shirt pocket. |
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