India, China and Japan

Ships from the Rigveda, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, the Buddhist and Jain canons, the Guru Granth Sahib, the Zhuangzi and the Kojiki.

This chapter of Sacred Ships holds 13 ships. For each one we give the source, what happens, and only what the text itself says about the vessel. See all 102 ships on one page.

Subject to interpretation, Marea can build any of these ships as a scale model, with the maximum detail the scale permits. We build her as the text describes her: the timber, the oars, the sails. Seventeen of these texts even give her size or her crew.

This database was put together by Ai Refloat™, Marea’s own artificial intelligence, from published translations of the texts and from museum and university sources. Ai Refloat is still young & like any teenager, it can be a little volatile and unpredictable at times, but above all, it is learning fast. So this list may well contain mistakes and we welcome the input of everyone who knows these texts and traditions better than we do.

Have you spotted a mistake? Tell us which ship and which text, and we will amend it accordingly. Tell us here

The ships

India, China and Japan · Hindu
The Ship of Bhujyu Voyaging ship
Rigveda 1.116.3 to 5 (Griffith)
Tradition Hindu
Tugra abandons his son Bhujyu in the ocean “as a dead man leaves his riches”. The twin gods, the Ashvins, rescue him and carry him home across a sea that offers no support or hold.
The vessel Living vessels that travel through the air without being wetted by the waves; Bhujyu is finally “borne in a ship with hundred oars”.
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Hindu
Vidura's Boat Boat
Mahabharata, Adi Parva, Section CLI (Ganguli)
Tradition Hindu
The Pandavas escape the burning house of lac through a secret tunnel with their mother Kunti. At the Ganges a man sent by Vidura has a boat ready and carries them across.
The vessel “A boat with engines and flags”, built by trusted craftsmen, able to withstand wind and wave, as fast as the tempest or thought.
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Hindu
Guha's Boat on the Ganges Boat
Ramayana, Book II, Canto LII (Griffith)
Tradition Hindu
Guha, king of the boatmen, has a boat made ready for the exiled Rama. Lakshmana helps Sita aboard; midstream Sita prays to the goddess of the river, and they land on the far shore.
The vessel A boat with rudder, oars and crew: “A boat,” he cried, “swift, strong, and fair”.
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Buddhist
The Raft of the Dhamma Symbolic ship
Majjhima Nikaya 22, Alagaddupama Sutta (Sujato)
Tradition Buddhist
A traveller reaches a great flood with no boat or bridge, binds a raft and crosses. On the far shore he leaves the raft behind instead of carrying it, and the Buddha likens his teaching to this raft.
The vessel Grass, sticks, branches and leaves, paddled with hands and feet: a teaching “for crossing over, not for holding on”.
Sources SuttaCentral
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Buddhist
The Ship of Suppāraka Voyaging ship
Jataka 463 (Cowell, vol. IV)
Tradition Buddhist
The blind master mariner Suppāraka pilots merchants through a series of marvellous seas to the perilous Vaḷabhāmukha. He makes a solemn act of truth and the ship returns to Bharukaccha in a single day.
The vessel A merchant ship with seven hundred aboard, which comes back laden with treasure and glides over dry land to the mariner's door.
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Buddhist
The Wreck of Mahājanaka Voyaging ship
Jataka 539 (Cowell, vol. VI)
Tradition Buddhist
Prince Mahājanaka sails to win back his father's kingdom and the ship sinks in mid ocean. He oils his clothes, leaps clear from the mast and swims for seven days until the sea goddess Maṇimekhalā carries him to a mango grove near Mithilā.
The vessel A trading ship with seven caravans and their beasts aboard; as it sinks, “the mast stood upright”.
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Jain
The Boat of the Body Symbolic ship
Uttarādhyayana Sūtra 23.70 to 73 (Jacobi)
Tradition Jain
Kesi asks Gautama how he will reach the far shore in a boat drifting on an ocean of currents. Gautama answers that a leaking boat will not arrive but a sound one will.
The vessel “The body is the boat, life is the sailor”; the ocean is the Circle of Births.
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Sikh
The Bohith of the Guru Symbolic ship
Guru Granth Sahib, Ang 17 (Guru Nanak)
Tradition Sikh
Gurbani describes the Guru as the ship that carries the seeker across the world ocean of birth and death.
The vessel The bohith, the ship, is the Guru: “Gur sar saagar bohitho” (Ang 17). Image rule: ship only, no human figures.
Sources SriGranth Ang 17
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Taoist
The Empty Boat Symbolic ship
Zhuangzi, chapter 20, The Mountain Tree (paraphrased; no public domain translation reached)
Tradition Taoist
A man crossing a river is struck by an empty drifting boat and is not angry; had someone been aboard, he would have shouted. The ruler of Lu is urged to empty himself in the same way.
The vessel Two boats: the traveller's craft of two hulls lashed together, and the empty boat with no one aboard.
Sources 26reads
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Shinto
The Reed Boat of Hiruko Boat
Kojiki, Section IV (Chamberlain)
Tradition Shinto
The leech child, first born of Izanagi and Izanami, is not counted among their children and is set adrift.
The vessel “This child they placed in a boat of reeds, and let it float away.”
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Shinto
Bird's Rock Camphor Tree Boat Boat of a god
Kojiki, Section VI (Chamberlain)
Tradition Shinto
Among the deities born to Izanagi and Izanami after the islands is one who is itself a boat.
The vessel A divine vessel named for the swiftness of a bird and a hull hard as rock of camphor wood, also called the Heavenly Bird Boat, Ame no tori fune.
Sources sacred-texts.com
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Japanese folk belief
Takarabune, the Treasure Ship Voyaging ship
Folk belief and woodblock prints, from the Muromachi period
Tradition Japanese folk belief
The Seven Lucky Gods sail the Takarabune into port in the first three days of the New Year. A print of it under the pillow on the night of 2 January brings a lucky first dream.
The vessel Laden with the hat of invisibility, rolls of brocade, an inexhaustible purse, a magic mallet and a fortune bag; prints often add a crane and a turtle.
Sources Wikipedia
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.
India, China and Japan · Shinto
The Seed Pod Boat of Sukunabikona Boat
Kojiki and Nihon Shoki
Tradition Shinto
Ōkuninushi sees a tiny boat on the waves at Miho Bay carrying a god no bigger than a thumb, who bites his cheek and will not give his name until the scarecrow god names him.
The vessel A boat made from the seed pod of a Metaplexis plant.
Sources Wikipedia
Illustration: an AI interpretation of the text, to come.