Gopher wood

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A painting of Noah's Ark, said to be constructed from gopher wood.

Gopher wood or gopherwood is a term used once in the Bible, for the substance whose identity is unknown from which Noah's ark was built.

[edit] Question over identity

Gen 6:14 states that Noah built the Ark of גפר (gofer, more commonly gopher) wood, a word not otherwise known in the Bible or in Hebrew. The Jewish Encyclopedia believes it was most likely a translation of the Babylonian "gushure i÷ erini" (cedar-beams), or the Assyrian "giparu" (reed).^[1] The Greek Septuagint (3rd–1st centuries BC) translated it as מ‎כשם פופסבד‏םשם ("xylon tetragonon"), "squared timber".^[2] Similarly, the Latin Vulgate (5th century AD) rendered it as "lignis levigatis", or "smoothed (possibly planed) wood".

Older English translations, including the King James Version (17th century), simply leave it untranslated. Many modern translations tend to favour cypress (although the word for "cypress" in Biblical Hebrew is erez), following Adam Clarke, a Methodist theologian famous for his commentary on the Bible: Clarke cited the resemblance between Greek word for cypress, kuparisson and the Hebrew word gophar, although Greek and Hebrew are not related languages and and the linguistic resemblance is superficial. Other suggestions include pine, cedar, fir, ebony, wicker, juniper, acacia, boxwood, slimed bulrushes and resinous wood, and even American trees such asCladrastis kentuckea, or American yellowwood, although this type of gopherwood has no known relation to the material of Noah's Ark. Recent suggestions have included a lamination process (to strengthen the Ark), or a now-lost type of tree, but there is no consensus.^[3] Others suggest mere scribal error, noting the physical similarity between the Hebrew letters g and k, that the word may actually be kopher.^{[citation needed]} In Hebrew, kopher means pitch; thus kopher wood would be pitched wood. In full, Genesis 6:14 would then read: "Make yourself an ark of pitched [wood], put various compartments in it, and cover it inside and outside with pitch." Whether this is redundant, or refers to the wood being pitched both before and after construction is an open question.

[edit] Fictional references

In the Pendragon Cycle by Stephen R. Lawhead, gopherwood, along with orichalcum and samite, other little known ancient materials, is mentioned frequently in the first volume, much of which takes place in Atlantis.
The American movie Evan Almighty makes a wordplay on the term, turning it into a lumber company called, "Go-4-Wood".