A “clerk’s copy” of a document is usually the recorded copy created by the clerk tasked with the duty of maintaining copies of official records. The handwritten copy of the will in a record book is the clerk’s copy. Your ancestor’s deed for a piece of real estate you found at the courthouse in a bound ledger is the clerk’s copy. These copies are usually legally equivalent to the original document.
That’s why it is important for these copies to be exact and why as technology for document reproduction has improved, the way clerk’s copies are created has improved as well.
But that clerk’s copy is not the same thing as the original. It’s a derivative copy, but generally a clerk’s copy includes any errors that were included in the original. The clerk’s job was to copy exactly–not to correct or to change.
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