Roman Abacus
The Roman abacus was developed in ancient Rome from the Babylonian abacus. The Roman abacus is a portable base 10 version of the Babylonian abacus. When compared with the later, the Roman abacus is less capable.
The Roman abacus was the 1st portable calculating device that was used by architects, engineers, merchants and tax collectors. It greatly simplified mathematical calculations.
To perform higher order calculations such as those involved in land surveys, The Romans used a reckoning board in addition to the abacus. However, none of these Roman boards have survived till our present time.
The ancient Roman abacus appeared very similar to the modern Japanese Soroban. However, the Japanese Soroban is based on the Chinese suanpan.
In a counting board, rows or columns represent nothing i.e. zero. However, Roman numerals were all positive and thus, there was no need for a zero notation. The Romans were aware about the concept of zero.
It is also possible that the Romans might have been aware about negative numbers. It might have come as a result of tallying loans and investments and profits and losses.
