In Genesis, what material is Noah’s Ark said to have been made from?

In Genesis, Noah’s Ark is said to have been made from gopher wood.

Genesis 6:14 instructs Noah to make the Ark from “gopher wood,” but the text does not identify that material with a known modern tree species. The Hebrew term appears only in this passage, making its precise botanical meaning uncertain.

Some translations retain “gopher wood,” while others have tried to convey the idea with terms such as resinous wood or timber. Proposed identifications have included cypress and other durable woods, but no interpretation has been universally established from the biblical text.

This uncertainty distinguishes the answer from materials mentioned elsewhere in the Ark instructions. Genesis does specify that the Ark was divided into compartments and waterproofed with pitch, but pitch was a coating, not the main construction material. Therefore, “gopher wood” is the canonical traditional answer, while the exact species remains unknown.