Object Details
- Description
- This instrument sits in a wooden box painted black around the edge. It has a wooden cross piece painted white. Twenty-one parallel bamboo rods rods pass through the cross piece. Each has one bead above the cross piece and five below.
- The beads are similar in shape to those on other Japanese abaci. Every column but the middle one is labeled on the cross piece with a Japanese character. The ten beads to the left of the center may represent units of volume, those to the right are units of currency.
- A stamp attached to the box below the beads that shows a Japanese diety known as Daikoku sama operating an abacus. Characters printed on the stamp refer to a trademark and to Osaka. A sticker attached to the back has characters on it that may represent a price in a vendor's code. The object is marked on the back in pen “4504.” It is recorded as found in museum storage in 1959.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- before 1959
- ID Number
- MA.316866
- catalog number
- 316866
- accession number
- 228691
- Object Name
- abacus
- Physical Description
- wood (overall material)
- bamboo (overall material)
- Measurements
- overall: 1.8 cm x 35.6 cm x 8 cm; 23/32 in x 14 1/32 in x 3 5/32 in
- place made
- Japan
- See more items in
- Medicine and Science: Mathematics
- Abacus
- Science & Mathematics
- National Museum of American History
- Subject
- Asian
- Mathematics
- Record ID
- nmah_690529
- GUID (Link to Original Record)
- https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746a5-17a3-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa
