What is this unit of measurement from 1728?

[bristolloggerheads]

Does this say 150 lbs of shoes? You'll see that worsted stuff has the same unit of measurement.

Peter

[Dulaigh]

Pr for pair

[miggins]

Hi bristolloggerheads

I was wondering if the worsted stuff was wrapped in something that was referred to as a 'shoe'?   It may be an old term used by cloth weavers.

Regards

miggins

[Koromo]

It looks like ℓd^s  — I wonder if it means loads.

From A Dictionary of Units of Measurement:

"In Britain prior to modern times, a load was sometimes a standardized unit, but it varied with the commodity being carried. A typical size was 40 bushels (roughly 1.4 cubic meters)."

http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/

But then again, there would be an awful lot of shoes in 210m³ !!   

[bristolloggerheads]

It is an official customs record so I would expect it to be a defined measure - it does look like "ld" though.

[pinot]

Is 'lbs' an option?

[KGarrad]

Are you sure it's a measurement, and not a check-mark?

E.G. somebody's initials, after checking the quantities?

[mike175]

Difficult to say without more context, but loads seems the most likely.

I believe a "load" would be the amount that could be carried on a cart pulled by a horse: usually about a ton for heavy goods, but lighter items would be limited by volume (40 bushels of grain weighs roughly 1 ton)

If this is a Customs record it probably refers to ships' cargoes so 210 m³ would not be unreasonable.

Mike.

[miggins]

Hi

Any chance it might just be an archaic way of writing yards?!!!

miggins