Can anyone tell me what this item is ?

[john mack]

I purchased these items with a lot of things from an Australian soldiers box of bringback items .

[john mack]

2

2

[Franco]

Hi,
Its an abbacus,used in the Mid and Far East by traders etc to add and subract money or items.
The wooden discs are flicked up or down in one column and then you move to
the next column and so it goes up in units,tens,hundreds,thousands.
These were pre electronic calculators.

[GHP]

Yes, abbacus. The Japanese word is soroban. This one belonged to Nishikawa Shizuo [West River, Quiet Boy]

西川静男

--Guy

[john mack]

kanji

Thank you for the Kanji reading Guy .