abacus

Calculators, cars and probably candles and the abacus were considered a menace to society.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 7, 2025

Recently, a lovely and well-meaning friend texted me one of those trending articles that make you want to trade your smartphone for an abacus and never speak of the internet again.

From New York Times ● Mar. 9, 2024

For example, you can add numbers perfectly using an abacus, in which wooden beads are pushed back and forth to represent arithmetic operations.

From Science Daily ● Oct. 30, 2023

You can put away the abacus for this year though.

From BBC ● Dec. 9, 2022

“No, we do not need a sextant—nor an abacus, Cassiopeia, please put that back.”

From "The Hidden Gallery" by Maryrose Wood

All three brands also use Western-style abaci, but with seven, six, and five beads, respectively, making them little more than depictions of toys.

From The Verge ● May 26, 2019

Kidwell wasn’t aware of any abaci in the museum’s collection that used an arrangement similar to Apple’s, and even the ones that came close wouldn’t have been arranged horizontally like Apple’s icon is.

From The Verge ● May 26, 2019

On the other hand, Samsung, Twitter, and WhatsApp’s abaci are also incorrect.

From The Verge ● May 26, 2019

Sitting at their abaci, with hot green tea and cold rice balls for refreshment, the election clerks diligently tallied their beads and the vote.

From Time Magazine Archive

One is cluttered with newspapers and tattlers and scandal sheets, another with petit-hourglasses and abaci.

From "The Belles" by Dhonielle Clayton

Much of the buzz around the subject in recent years has been about the development of powerful quantum computers which, the narrative goes, will make our fastest supercomputers seem like abacuses by comparison.

From BBC ● Mar. 2, 2025

The floating ships in the fantasy role-playing game Honkai: Star Rail are populated with traders, gourmets and literati who surf their texts on jade abacuses.

From New York Times ● Oct. 22, 2023

Behind him are displayed a 1,500-year-old sake pot, a vertical wall of abacuses and various objets d'art befitting a place walking distance from Little Tokyo.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 16, 2015

A section of the exhibition devoted to educational toys includes abacuses, toy telephones, a child-size loom and kits for constructing machines, cars and buildings.

From New York Times ● Sep. 17, 2015

They used slates for writing, and abacuses, weights, and measures for math.

From "Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers" by Deborah Heiligman