The Book of Zelph is a record of peoples in ancient America, and was engraved upon plates, and other types of writing surfaces. Six kinds of records are spoken of in the book itself:

1. The Plates of Laban, which were many kinds: Gold plates, silver plates with jewels fastened in the corners, bronze plates, and steel plates. The stories on these plates make up the bulk of the Book of Zelph, and were written on by Laban the younger, the Whores, and Dances with Cureloms.
    
2. The Son of Abitch's Scrolls, which consist of poems by the Son of Abitch, written by his own hand, upon papyrus. Zelph abridged some of his poems, and included them in the final abridged plates. Many of the original papyrus scrolls were lost in a casino fire.
    
3. The Leather Plates of Dances with Cureloms, which were used after running out of metal plates. Dances with Cureloms switched to leather plates, since that was the writing surface of choice for his tribe.
   
   
4. The Small Stone Tablets of the Trial, which consist of an abridgment of Nephi's trial in absentia for the murder of Laban. Laban the younger lost the original sixteen plates which were a full narrative of the trial. Rather than retranslate, for fear his enemies had set a trap for him, he decided to simply abridge the trial story on small stone tablets. 
    
5. The Leather Plates of Zelph, which consist of an abridgment by Zelph from the Plates of Laban, the Small Stone Tablets of the Trial, the Son of Abitch's poem scrolls, and Dances with Curelom's Leather Pages. These plates also contained the account of Zelph, and additions by his son Melph. These are the plates that were given to Josh Anderson.
   
   
6. The Plates of Brass, part of Laban the elder's antiquities collection. Stolen by Nephi, after Nephi beheaded Laban. Nephi was convicted of murder and robbery for his actions. The whereabouts of Laban's brass plates are unknown.

The Book of Zelph comprises nine main parts or divisions, known as books, each designated by the name of its principal author, or authors. The bulk of the Book of Zelph (1 Laban through Dances with Cureloms) is the history of the Lamanites from the time of Laban the Younger in Jerusalem, until the death of Zelph in a terrible archery accident, during the final Nephite-Lamanite wars. The concluding portion, the Book of Melph, was engraved by Zelph’s son Melph, who added some final thoughts.

In or about the year A.D. 400, Melph closed his father's abridgment, and put it on his book shelf. In A.D. 2004, this same Melph, and his father Zelph, now ghosts, visited Josh Anderson in a grove of trees, and subsequently delivered the Leather Plates of Zelph to him.