Market Token Adie & Sons 1 Cran = measure of herring Token ticket Shetland Scotland
brass 32.2mm holed
A cran was a measure of herring – 37.5 Imperial gallons.  This would be about 1200 of unprocessed fish
The fact that it is a measure of whole fish would seem to associate the token with the fishermen to processor transaction.
As it has no monetary value: it is not a box deposit as used in Billingsgate.
Thomas Mountford Adie (1815 – 1884)
was the founder of the company with his sons in the 1880’s.
This token was made for the herring trade which started around 1880 when it took over from the declining cod trade. Â So it dates from about 1880-1900
The company was important in most of the Shetland fishing ports.
We have never seen one of these for sale in 45 years so probably quite rare.
see  https://www.sailing-by.org.uk/herring-voe-shetland-1881/
and https://voehouse.co.uk/history/
for information about the Shetland herring fishery and the company
