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 in one series or in various classified registers such as registers of deeds, contracts, marriages, etc. The name is used also of histories written up on the basis of these register-books (the Books of Chronicles are in Hebrew "Words of days") but not themselves records.

The words of Samuel may therefore refer to such a history, or book or annals, rather than an official priestly register such as that of the Maccabean priest king and those of the kings of Israel and Judah but in every event even the briefer term, like the term Book of the words of days itself, points directly to a collection of original documents or archives and in view of comparative archival practice there is good reason to suppose these "words" of Samuel too are an official book of records like those of David and all following kings. These charter books of course, so far as they go, mirror the contents of the archives which they