See quotations.

1

[1713].  Their wheat they carried on men’s backs to Schenectady, to grind, a distance of twenty miles, each man carrying his skipple to his load.—John F. Watson, ‘Annals of New York,’ p. 61 (1846).

2

1796.  

        Not far from Albany, among the Dutch,
A skipple-stone is used to balance weight
On horse-back borne.
The Aurora, Sept. 13.    

3

1796.  These lines appeared on the same day in the Gazette of the U.S., Phila., with other verses:

        In France they lately had a skipple-stone, &c.

4

1824.  [We imagine] the beautiful Mrs. O., holding a skipple of seed corn in her striped petticoat.—The Microscope, Albany, Feb. 28.

5

1901.  See also ‘Dialect Notes,’ ii. 147.

6