There are generally two definitions of a \emph{simplicial abelian group}, an abstract one and a very explicit one. We will start with the abstract one, and immediately show in pictures what the explicit definition looks like.
$$\delta_i: [n]\to[n+1], k \mapsto\begin{cases} k &\text{if } k < i;\\ k+1&\text{if } k \geq i. \end{cases}\hspace{0.5cm}0\leq i \leq n+1, \text{ and}$$
$$\sigma_i: [n+1]\to[n], k \mapsto\begin{cases} k &\text{if } k \leq i;\\ k-1&\text{if } k > i. \end{cases}\hspace{0.5cm}0\leq i \leq n$$
for each $n \in\N$. The nice things about these maps is that every map in $\DELTA$ can be decomposed to a composition of these maps. So in a certain sense, these are all the maps we need to consider. We can now picture the category $\DELTA$ as follows.
\begin{figure}[h!]
\label{fig:delta_cat}
\includegraphics{delta_cat}
\caption{The category $\DELTA$ with the face and degeneracy maps.}
Now the category $\sAb$ is defined as the category $\Ab^{\DELTA^{op}}$. Because the face and degeneracy maps give all the maps in $\DELTA$ it is sufficient to define images of $\delta_i$ and $\sigma_i$ in order to define a functor $F: \DELTA^{op}\to Ab$. And hence we can picture a simplicial abelian group as done in figure~\ref{fig:simplicial_abelian_group}. Comparing this to figure~\ref{fig:delta_cat} we see that the arrows are reversed, because $A$ is a contravariant functor.
Because a simplicial abelien group $A$ is a contravariant functor, these equations (which only consist of compositions and identities) also hold in its image. For example the first equation would look like: $ A(\delta_i)A(\delta_j)= A(\delta_{j-1})A(\delta_i)$ for $ i < j$ (again note that $A$ is contravariant, and hence composition is reversed). This can be used for a explicit definition of simplicial abelien groups. In this definition a simplicial abelian group $A$ consists of a family abelian groups $(A_n)_{n}$ together with face and degeneracy maps (which are grouphomomorphisms) such that the simplicial equations hold.
Of course the abstract definition of simplicial abelian group can easilty be generalized to other categories. For example $\Set^{\DELTA^{op}}=\sSet$ is the category of simplicial sets.
\todo{sAb: as example do the free abelian group pointwise}