initiated by them into the art of writing, lost no time in setting down, in their turn, all they could recall of the destinies of their race from the creation of the world down to the time in which they lived.  From the beginning of the monarchical epoch onwards, their scribes collected together in the Book of the Wars of the Lord, the Book of Jashar, and in other works the titles of which have not survived, lyrics of different dates, in which nameless poets had sung the victories and glorious deeds of their national heroes, such as the Song of the Well, the Hymn of Moses, the triumphal Ode of Deborah, and the blessing of Jacob.* They were able to draw upon traditions which preserved the memory of what had taken place in the time of the Judges;** and when that patriarchal form of government was succeeded by a monarchy, they had narratives of the ark of the Lord and its wanderings, of Samuel, Saul, David, and Solomon,*** not to mention the official records which, since then, had been continuously produced and accumulated by the court historians.****

* The books of Jashar and of the Wars of the Lord appear to date from the IXth century B.C.; as the latter is quoted in the Elohist narrative, it cannot have been compiled later than the beginning of the VIIIth century B.C.  The passage in Numb. xxi. lib, 15, is the only one expressly attributed by the testimony of the ancients to the Book of the Wars of the Lord, but modern writers add to this the Song of the Well (Numb. xxi. 17b, 18), and the Song of Victory over Moab (Numb. xxi. 27&-30).  The Song of the Bow (2 Sam. i. 19-27) admittedly formed part of the Book of Jashar.  Joshua’s Song of Victory over the Amorites (Josh. x. 13), and very probably the couplet recited by Solomon at the dedication of the Temple (1 Kings viii, 12, 13, placed by the LXX. after verse 53), also formed part of it, as also the Song of Deborah and the Blessing of Jacob (Gen. xlix. 1-27).

** Wellhausen was the first to admit the existence of a Book of Judges prior to the epoch of Deuteronomy, and his opinion has been adopted by Kuenen and Driver.  This book was probably drawn upon by the two historians of the IXth and VIIIth centuries B.C. of whom we are about to speak; some of the narratives, such as the story of Abimelech, and possibly that of Ehud, may have been taken from a document written at the end of the Xth or the beginning of the IXth centuries B.C.

*** The revolutions which occurred in the family of David (2 Sam. ix.-xx.) bear so evident a stamp of authenticity that they have been attributed to a contemporary writer, perhaps Ahimaaz, son of Zadok (2 Sam. xv. 27), who took part in the events in question.  But apart from this, the existence is generally admitted of two or three books which were drawn up shortly after the separation of the tribes, containing a kind of epic of the history of the first two kings; the