Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (mainly Aus./N.Z.) drunk.

1872		A. Edersheim Miriam Rosenbaum 78: ‘Levi, is the shickzah* shikkor?**’ remonstrated Mrs. Rosenbaum. [*Shekez literally means abomination, and is in Scripture applied to unclean fish, birds, and other beasts. It is an expression of contempt, chiefly applied to Gentiles. Shickzah is the feminine of it. **Intoxicated with drink].
1880		Bulletin (Sydney) 24 July 3/2: At the end they schlumpussed home, / Trotted out and shicker.
1886		Sporting Times 10 Apr. 3/2: I got shikkur on Pesach / Instead o a-going to shool.
1890		‘Morris the Mohel’ ‘Houndsditch Day By Day’ in Sporting Times 11 Jan. 3: He thinks he plays better vhen he’s shikkur.
1893		Referee (Sydney) 8 Feb. 6/6: They were talking of someone who had a ‘load’. ‘Load of what?’, asked Dan. ‘Firewater’, was the response [...] ‘Oh now I tumble’, said Dan. ‘He was shick, eh?’.
1899		Windsor, Richmond & Hawkesbury Advertiser (NSW) 21 Apr. n.p.: Of course, he was pretty ‘shikker’, so we’ll excuse him this week.
1899		A. Binstead Houndsditch Day by Day 46: After he’s shtood her two or t’ree glass o’ peer she comes over shikkur.
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 31 Jan. 4/5: This particular brand of grape-juice seems to owe most of its vogue to the fact that it is cheap and fillng at the price, and that a few glasses of it are warranted to make the imbiber as ‘shic’ as a violinist .
1906		Gadfly (Adelaide) 28 Mar. 9/1: But the John wants a finger in the custard, so ’e takes me in charge fer bein’ shick, an’ I goes along quiet.
1906		Sun. Times (Perth) 15 Apr. 4/8: Do they growl about the percentage, Flo, / Do you ever get shicker-bill?
1909		Age (Queanbeyan, NSW) 12 Jan. 2: The lockup at Watson Bay [...] isn’t fit to put a man in. Some people, perhaps, don’t care much, especially if they are shicker, where they gets lumbered.
1910		Bulletin (Sydney) 18 Aug. 14/1: One of the unwritten laws of the Bush is : See your mate home when he is ‘shick.’.
1913		Sport (Adelaide) 4 Oct. 4/1: G W is the cricketer. he stands at the wicket all night, shick or sober .
1913		Day Book (Chicago) 6 Aug. 17/4: You would say that I was shicker again.
1914		Sport (Adelaide) 3 Apr. 5/3: Was the push chloroformed or shic .
1915		C.J. Dennis ‘A Spring Song’ in Songs of a Sentimental Bloke 14: I’ve lorst me former joy in gittin’ shick.
1924		C.J. Dennis ‘The Knight’s Return’ in Chisholm (1951) 86: Then ’e wades in an’ tells me ‘oo ’e is – / (’e ain’t a bad ole coot when ’e ain’t shick).
1924		(con. WWI) A.G. Pretty Gloss. Sl. [...] in the A.I.F. 1921–1924 (rev. t/s) n.p.: shick. Intoxicated.
1928		M. Prenner ‘Sl. Synonyms for “Drunk”’ in AS IV:2 102: basted [...] shicker (Jewish).
1929		S. Ornitz Haunch Paunch and Jowl 9: The shicker goy (drunken Gentile), seated on a box, is laboriously sewing up a rent in his pants.
1932		(con. WWI) L. Mann Flesh in Armour 259: ‘A Tommy officer [...] a bit shick’.
1934		C. Stead Seven Poor Men of Sydney 255: Let’s go and get shicker.
1935		A. Kober Thunder over the Bronx 87: The way you talk a person could think you were a little shikka.
1938		Western Mail (Perth) 10 Nov. 26/6: One writer claimed that eight out of 19 Australian slang words mentioned here were ‘of obvious Hebrew and Yiddish origin.’ [...] ‘cliner’, from ‘klein’ [...] ‘cobber’ from ‘chaver’, [...] ‘furphy’ [...] from the Yiddish ‘furfeer,’ to mislead, ‘guyver’, make believe [...] ‘rybebuck,’ correct or genuine, from the Hebrew ‘reivach’, meaning profit, ‘shick’ [...] meaning drunk, ‘smoodge.’ from the hebrew ‘schmoo-os’ [...] ‘yakker’ from ‘akeren’, meaning to plough.
1941		Baker Popular Dict. Aus. Sl. 65: Shick, drunk.
1943		J.A.W. Bennett ‘Eng. as it is Spoken in N.Z.’ in AS XVIII:2 Apr. 89: A thoroughly drunk man is stonkered, floored, stunned, or, as in New York, shicker; and this last word, itself of Yiddish origin, has produced shickered and on the shicker.
1945		A. Kober Parm Me 35: The way you talk a person could think you were a little shikka.
1961		B. Crump Hang On a Minute, Mate (1963) 119: Why didn’t they give him a bunk for the night if he was so shikker?
1962		F. Norman Guntz 38: I found myself getting more than a little shicker.
1963–74		B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 22: A bloke’d need a real skinfull of cider to get decently shicker.
1975		K. Willey Ghosts of the Big Country xiii: There was the ‘Shicker Vicar’, at one time an Anglican parson [...] who, when he opened his fridge at the rectory would disclose [...] ranks of bottles.
1982		N. Keesing Lily on the Dustbin 147: ‘Shiker’ or ‘shickered’ for drunk is a direct borrowing from the Yiddish shikker; as is ‘mozzle’ for luck which comes from the Yiddish mazel (pronounced to rhyme with nozzle).
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 185: shick/shicker/shickered/on the shicker Drunk. From the Yiddish word shiker, to be drunk. ANZ 1880s.

2. (Aus.) ill, ‘under the weather [? ext. of the hangover that dervives from drinking].

1898

Broadford Courier (Vic.) 25 Feb. 5/3: No one is ever ill only ‘a trifle off color,’ or, in more severe cases, ‘feel cronk,’ or ‘crook,’ or even ‘shicker’ .