arithmetic operation

…how to perform the four arithmetic operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. In it the numbers are written in Chinese characters, but, for most of the procedures described, the actual computations are intended to be performed on a surface, perhaps on the ground. Most probably, as can be inferred…

The Egyptians, like the Romans after them, expressed numbers according to a decimal scheme, using separate symbols for 1, 10, 100, 1,000, and so on; each symbol appeared in the expression for a number as many times as the value it represented occurred…

The four arithmetic operations were performed in the same way as in the modern decimal system, except that carrying occurred whenever a sum reached 60 rather than 10. Multiplication was facilitated by means of tables; one typical tablet lists the multiples of a number by 1, 2,…