shippound
(ˈʃɪpˈpaʊnd)
Also 6 schip pund, 8 schippound, scheppund, 9 shippund.
[ad. MLG. schippunt (see also skippound) or MDu. schippond; whence ON. skippund, G. schiffpfund, etc.]
A unit of weight used in the Baltic trade, varying from 300 to 400 pounds; = 20 lispounds.
| 1545 Rates of Customs d vj, In Spruce lande..xx. lispoundes facit a shyp pounde. 1560 Stirling Burgh Rec. (1887) I. 75 For half schip pund irn. 1615 in Compt bk. D. Wedderburne (S.H.S.) 263, 6 schip pund gaid Irone. 1654 Whitelocke Jrnl. Swed. Amb. (1772) II. 120, 200 shippownd of copper to be brought from the mines to Stockholme. 1753 Hanway Trav. (1762) I. ii. xi. 51 The quantity of the hemp is generally about forty thousand schippounds. 1796 Morse Amer. Geog. II. 49 The furnaces and forges [in Sweden] produce yearly 400000 scheppund. 1858 Homans Cycl. Comm. 423 The commercial weights [of Copenhagen] are, 16 pounds = 1 lispound; 20 lispound = 1 shippound. 1872 Yeats Growth Comm. 306, 19,000 ship pounds of iron exported from Gothenburg. |