Soroban, or Japanese Abacus
date: label: date made
content: before 1959
notes: label: Description
content: 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.
label: Description
content: 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.
label: Description
content: 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.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: Japan
topic: label: Subject
content: Asian
label: Subject
content: Mathematics
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Mathematics
label: See more items in
content: Abacus
label: See more items in
content: Science & Mathematics
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: MA.316866
label: catalog number
content: 316866
label: accession number
content: 228691
objectType: label: Object Name
content: abacus
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: wood (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: bamboo (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1.8 cm x 35.6 cm x 8 cm; 23/32 in x 14 1/32 in x 3 5/32 in