sarpler

1

In England, 13^th – 18^th centuries, a unit of mass used for wool. As an object, a sarpler was a large coarse bag. Spellings like serplaith and sirplithe indicate the Scottish version of this unit.

The usual definition of the sarpler is = 2 sacks = 728 pounds avoirdupois of wool (about 330.2 kilograms).

Sources

“..the sacke wyll con[tain] iii^clxiiij lb. woll....

“Also woll ys sold by numbre and schipped to, as by sacks, sarplers, and pokys. ii sacks make a sarpler, and x sarplers make a laste, and the poke ys at no serteyne, butt aftre as ytt weys. ...

"Butt as fore Powndes and Sarplers, thai be butt lityll usyd in beyng and sellyng amonge merchauntes; for thai use to by or sell most comynly odyr by the Clawe, the Nayle, or by the Stone or the Todde, or the Sake.”

The sacke will contain 364 pounds of wool. ...

Also, wool is sold and shipped by number [instead of by weight in pounds], as by sacks, sarplers and pokes. Two sacks make a sarpler, and 10 sarplers make a last. The poke is not a certain size, but sold by its weight. ...

But as for pounds and sarplers, they be but little used in buying and selling among merchants, for they use to buy or sell most commonly either by the claw, the nail, or by the stone or the tod, or the sack.

MS Cotton, Vesp. E. IX (15th century)

2

In England, beginning in the late 17^th century and continuing to the early 19^th century, a series of dictionaries define the sarpler as half a sack, equivalent to a pocket. This value should perhaps be viewed with suspicion. By this time the sarpler was probably not in use (a 15^th century source says the sarpler was already not in actual use, see the source under definition 1). Sheppard, apparently the first to give the half-sack definition, sounds none too sure of it, and the later authors may simply be echoing Sheppard.

Sources

“A Sarpler ... is a quantity of Wooll, and seems to be all one with a Weigh of Wooll. ...A Sarpler (otherwise called a Pocket) is a half Sack.”

Sheppard, 1665.

“A pocket of wool contained half a sack, and so did a sarpler.”

Lord Chief Justice Hale.
“A Treatise in Three Parts... Pars Tertia. Concerning the Customs of Goods Imported and Exported.”
in A Collection of Tracts Relative to the Law of England, from Manuscripts, Now First Edited. Vol. 1.
Francis Hargrave, editor.
London: Printed by T. Wright and sold by E. Brooke, 1787.

“SARPLER OF WOOL, a quantity of wool, otherwise called a pocket or half-sack; and contains 11 stone of wool at 14 lbs to the stone.”

Joseph Palethorpe.
A Commercial Dictionary of the Names of All the Coins, Weights and Measures in the World.
Derby, 1829.

3

In the late 19^th century, the sarpler begins to be defined as a long ton (2240 pounds of wool). This value may also be an error, in this case arising from a mistaken substitution of the tod for the stone.

Sources

“Sarpler: A large bale or package of wool, containing 80 tods, or a ton in weight.”

Peter Lund Simmonds.
The Commercial Dictionary of Trade Products, Manufacturing and Technical Terms. New edition revised and enlarged.
London: G. Routledge, 1898.

Eighty tods would indeed be a long ton (80 × 28 = 2240 pounds), which is larger than a last and much larger than any of the earlier definitions of the English sarpler.