Also 6 lespund, lesh pund, 7–8 leispound, (8 lispond), 8–9 lispund. [ad. LG. and Du. lispund, contr. f. livsch pund ‘Livonian pound’ = med.L. livonicum talentum. (An example, in the form lispunt, is quoted by Du Cange from a Polish document of 1454.)] A unit of weight used in the Baltic trade, and in Orkney and Shetland, varying at different periods and in different localities from 12 to 30 pounds.
1545. Rates Custom Ho., d vj. viii lyspoundes facit .c. li. xx. lispoundes facit a shyp pounde.
1597. Skene, De Verb. Signif., s.v. Serplaith, Ane stane and twa pound Scottish makis ane lesh pund.
1693. J. Wallace, Orkney, 92. Leispound a weight of their Victual, which contains 24 of their Merks: it is also called a Setten. This answers to 28 of our pounds.
1793. Statist. Acc. Scot., Shetl., V. 197. The butter … is delivered to the landlord in certain cases by the lispond. This denomination of weight consisted originally of only 12 Scotch or Dutch pounds. By various acts … it has been gradually raised to 30 lb.
1822. Scott, Pirate, i. Eight lispunds of butter.
1837. Macdougall, trans. Graah’s E. Coast Greenland, 33. A tribute of 127 lispounds of walrus-teeth.
1858. Homans, Cycl. Commerce, 1635. [At Riga] the lispound = 20 lbs. [= 18Á4 lbs. avoirdupois].
