The Chinese character for a ship () is formed from three words:
- , meaning a boat,
- K, meaning the number eight, and
- f, literally meaning mouths, i.e. human lives. The Chinese used this word to mean number of people of lives, as in "@af" or five mouths in a/the family.
On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. (Genesis 7:13)That is, 8 human lives were saved during the Great Flood.