Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (mainly Aus./N.Z.) drunk [shicker n. (1)].

1898		Bulletin (Sydney) 29 Oct. 3/3: A glass of beer is a ‘pot of wallop’, and the previous night he was ‘on his pink’, ‘juiced’, ‘wined’, or ‘shikkered.’.
1901		Bulletin (Sydney) 31 Aug. 3/2: The Sydney loafers fling a careless jeer: / ‘He’s ratty as a shikkered turkey-gobbler!’ / They love not wool who never learnt to shear, / Nor sympathise who never cursed a ‘cobbler.’.
1901		Capricorn (Rockhampton, Qld) 31 Aug. 26/4: He did not tell Constable Esplin that he knew the cheque was stolen, but that Green, seeing that he was ‘shiggared’ rung it in on him.
1905		Bulletin (Sydney) 9 Nov. 14/1: I never shall forget that night – / ’Twould make yer marrer creep; / For ’arf our street was shikkered up / When father won the sweep.
1908		Bulletin (Sydney) 19 Nov. 11/1: ‘What is “shickered”?’ Mr. Justice Simpson asked a witness in the Divorce Court to-day. ‘It means drunkenness, doesn’t it?’ replied the witness.
1908		E.G. Murphy ‘Is It Hot Enough?’ in Jarrahland Jingles 172: The front-bar bummer sidles to the shickered silv’ry bloke.
1910		Truth (Perth) 5 June 12/2: Well, them three got awful shikkered.
1911		L. Stone Jonah 124: ’E’s bin shickered since last Wednesday.
1912		H. Lawson ‘The Lily of St Leonards’ in Roderick (1972) 802: They call her the Lily of St Leonards. The boys shout it after her when she’s shickered.
1916		‘Anzac’ On the Anzac Trail 70: [A] couple of chaps who had been run in by the pickets for getting shikkared.
1920		G. Meek Chips Off the Old Stumbling Blocks 38: During a prohibition campaign, there is no rest for the shikkered.
1929		Register News-Pictorial (Adelaide) 11 Oct. 26/2: On the night of the tragedy he was pretty well stonkered [...] pretty well shickered.
1934		T. Wood Cobbers 209: He tole me he was goin’ to get sh-shickered, an’ he has.
1935		Townsville Daily Bulletin 18 Nov. 7/5: He don’t go down town and get shikkered.
1943		J.A.W. Bennett ‘Eng. as it is Spoken in N.Z.’ in AS XVIII:2 Apr. 89: A thoroughly drunk man is [...] shicker; and this last word, itself of Yiddish origin, has produced shickered and on the shicker.
1947		G. Casey Wits Are Out 97: He was half-shickered.
1951		D. Stivens Jimmy Brockett 22: I sent this after a barney with the girl, who thought I was shickered.
1955		N. Pulliam I Travelled a Lonely Land (1957) 238/2: shicked – drunk.
1959		G. Slatter Gun in My Hand 23: I was shikkered to beat the band.
1961		R.S. Close With Hooves of Brass 178: ‘Like the last time you were shickered, and reckoned your missus was covered in snakes and scorpions’.
1964		R. Helmer Stag Party 102: Enough grog to get us properly shickered.
1968		S. Gore Holy Smoke 90: But not to get paralytic. Not to get real shickered up.
1976		R. Morrieson Pallet on the Floor 69: It’s Jack Voot, real shickered.
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).
1986		R. Beckett Dinkum Aussie Dict. 46: Shicker: If one gets ‘on the shicker’ one intends to get drunk, hence shickered.
1986		(ref. to 1942) G.A. Wilkes Exploring Aus. Eng. 7: In 1942, when there was an influx of American servicemen into Australia, the US War and Navy Departments issued a Pocket Guide to Australia which listed common expressions which might be encountered. The Guide explained that [...] shikkered meant ‘drunk’.
1991		P. Carey Tax Inspector (1992) 56: He was half-shickered when he got the call.
1999		G. Seal Lingo 134: The effects of our occasionally over-enthusiastic imbibing show a great variety of invention and colour, including: [...] shickered; shit-faced (American); smashed. [Ibid.] 161: shickered, from the Yiddish for drunk, has been in use since at least the early 19th century [...] It was probably preceded by shick or shuck as a general term for excessive imbibing.
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.
2006		P. Carey Theft 84: I was shickered, three sheets to the wind.

2. out of funds, impoverished [prob. a nonce-use].

1962

R. Cook Crust on its Uppers 83: We were shickered.