A small wooden barrel or vessel, typically holding about a quarter of a barrel in capacity.
Possibly a diminutive or variant of 'firkin' (a quarter-barrel), from Middle Dutch 'vierde' (fourth) or related to the concept of a quarter-measure. This word appears in some dialect usage but is quite rare.
Before standardized containers, every trade had its own barrel sizes—a 'ferkin' was apparently someone's word for a smallish one, though 'firkin' became the standard term that survived.
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