A Double Conclusion

Chapter IV told the story of abbacus mathematics until the later 15th century in chronological order and in details – not all details, for sure, but enough perhaps to cloud the general view. Though in less detail but still with many details, chapter V dealt with how this mathematical culture was transformed when going into print and when re-emerging as Rechenmeister mathematics. This final chapter, drawing on the preceding two, presents a kind of summary and a perspective. The summary, synchronous, deals with the global “anthropology” of the abbacus endeavour – how can it be understood in its own world? The perspective, diachronic, looks at the role, not of abbacus mathematics as a whole but of abbacus algebra – its mathematically though not socially and economically most consequential component – in the longer historical process.