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# abacus

noun (an abacus; plural abacuses or abaci)

«abacus» in the English dictionary: everyday and in Jewish tradition — its meanings, how the lessons use it, and examples, each with its tree on Mova.

## Everyday

1. An abacus is a frame with rows of beads that slide along wires or rods, used for counting and doing sums. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#m1)
2. In buildings, an abacus is the flat slab on top of a column (architecture word). [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#m2)

### In the lessons

In maths lessons, the abacus helps children see place value: each row is a place (ones, tens, hundreds), and moving beads shows adding, taking away and carrying. In history, abacuses were used in ancient Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome and China; the Chinese suanpan and Japanese soroban are still used. Phrases: «count on an abacus», «move the beads».

### Examples

- We used an abacus to add 27 and 15. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#x1)
- On the abacus, the top row shows hundreds and the bottom row shows ones. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#x2)
- Some children in Japan learn very fast mental maths with a soroban abacus. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#x3)
- The abacus was used long before calculators. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#x4)
- Move three beads to the left to add three. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#x5)
- My little brother counts the coloured beads on his toy abacus. [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/#x6)

### Note

Plural: abacuses (most common) or abaci (formal). Say «AB-a-kus», stress on the first syllable. Maths: on a place-value abacus, each bead on the tens rod is worth 10, so 3 beads on tens and 4 on ones = 34; ten beads on one row are swapped for one bead on the next row up (carrying).

## In Jewish tradition

In maths lessons, the abacus helps children see place value: each row is a place (ones, tens, hundreds), and moving beads shows adding, taking away and carrying. In history, abacuses were used in ancient Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome and China; the Chinese suanpan and Japanese soroban are still used. Phrases: «count on an abacus», «move the beads».

### Examples

- ')) Some Pythagoreans used the strokes with the principle of \|iosi- tion without a zero in the columns of an abacus i Ur. (Mordell, The Origin of Letters and Numerals according to Sefer Yetzirah (1914)) [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/judaism/A/abacus/#x1)
- In my opinion, the sexagesimal position originated from the decimal position, and not the reverse ; for the earliest abacus, which was doubtless based on a decimal position, is older than the (Mordell, The Origin of Letters and Numerals according to Sefer Yetzirah (1914)) [tree →](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/judaism/A/abacus/#x2)

### Note

Plural: abacuses (most common) or abaci (formal). Say «AB-a-kus», stress on the first syllable. Maths: on a place-value abacus, each bead on the tens rod is worth 10, so 3 beads on tens and 4 on ones = 34; ten beads on one row are swapped for one bead on the next row up (carrying).

## On Mova

- [Trees and pragmatics of «abacus» in the school dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/A/abacus/): every meaning and example parsed by Mova, with its dependency tree and frames.
- [«abacus» in the school dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/dictionaries/school/w/abacus.html) on Mova free.
- [Trees and pragmatics of «abacus» in the Judaism dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/judaism/A/abacus/): every meaning and example parsed by Mova, with its dependency tree and frames.
- [«abacus» in the Judaism dictionary](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/dictionaries/judaism/w/abacus.html) on Mova free.