This is absolutely fascinating. Tally marks are a little visual language that has coevolved with the textual context. I don't have a link, but links appreciated.

the chinese symbol means "correct" https://translate.google.com/?sl=zh-TW&tl=en&text=%E6%AD%A3&op=translate

I grew up in China, the ‘zheng’ 正 character has a few meanings, but it kind of means “complete” in this case. It’s also marginally different from 五 which is the character for 5, I’ve always found that confusing.

The romantic version makes the most immediate sense to me

I'm not sure if this is what you are asking about, but it uses the word "Tally" 🙂 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tally_stick

I grew up in the US, and attended US public schools for the most part, and, I guess weirdly, was taught the box versions, from Brazil, France, etc. I wonder how strict this is? I thought the Australia, Europe, etc. version was only ever used in cartoons for the longest time 😆

I also wonder where Brazil has wandered off to that is no longer part of South America?