Vossius (on the LXX. C. II.) has sufficiently made it out, that
the timber of that denomination was of those sort of trees whose
branches breaking out just opposite to one another at right angles, make
it appear to have been fir, or some sort of wood whose arms grew in a
uniform manner; but surely this is not to be universally taken; since we
find yew, and divers other trees, brittle, heavy, and unapt for
shipping, do often put forth in that order: The same learned author will
have gopher to signifie only pitch, or bitumen, as much as if the text
had said, make an ark of resinous timber. The Chaldee paraphrase
translates it cedar, or as Junius and Tremellius, _cedrelaten_, a
species between fir and cedar: Munster contends for the pine, and divers
able divines endeavour to prove it cypress; and besides, 'tis known,
that in Crete they employ'd it for the same use in the largest
contignations, and did formerly build ships of it: And Epiphanius Haeres,
l. 1. tells us, some reliques of that ark (_circa campos sennaar_)
lasted even to his days, and was judged to have been of cypress. Some
indeed suppose that gopher was the name of a place, _a cupressis_, as
Elon _a quercubus_; and might possibly be that which Strabo calls
_Cupressetum_, near Adiabene in Assyria: But for the reason of its long
lasting, coffins (as noted) for the dead were made of it, and thence it
first became to be _diti sacra_; and the valves, or doors of the
Ephesine temple were likewise of it, as we observ'd but now, were those
of St. Peters at Rome: Works of cypress-wood, _permanent ad
diuturnitatem_, says Vitruvius l. 2. And the poet

.............._perpetua nunquam moritura cupresso._

Mart. E. 6. 6.

The medical virtues of this tree are for all affects of the nerves,
astringent and refrigerating, for the hernia, apply'd outwardly, or
taken inwardly, for the dysentary, strangury, &c.

But to resume the disquisition, whether it be truly so proper for
shipping, is controverted; though we also find in Cassiodorus _Var._ l.
5. ep. 16, Theodoric (writing to the _Praetorio-praefectus_) caused store
of it to be provided for that purpose; and Plato (who we told you made
laws, and titles to be engraven in it) nominates it, _inter arbores
+naupegois+ utiles_ l. 4. leg. and so does Diodorus l. 19. And as
travellers observe, there is no other sort of timber more fit for
shipping, {276:1} though others think it too heavy: Aristobulus affirms
that the Ass