Hello,
Nor sure if this really answer your question, but wss has two databases, Content database and Configuration database. Easiest way to save (backup) a site is to use the built in tools stsadm or smigrate.
Example how To backup (save) a sitecollection (including subsites) use:
stsadm.exe -o backup -url
-filename D:\backup\nameofbackupfile.bak
The above will backup everything in a site collection (including security settings like user permissions). The staadm will not allow you to just backup a single subsite, it works on site collection level.
To backup a single site SMIGRATE allows you to for example backup as subisite wihtin a site collection.
Example how to backup (save) a site with SMIGRATE
smigrate.exe -w
-f d:\backup\nameofbackupfile.fwp -u domain\username -pw yourpassword
To exclude subsites use -e
SMIGRATE does not backup security settings like user rights. You need to be a site administrator to use smigrate (might be a good idea to use an account that is an administrator on the server). And if Internet Explorer enhanced security is enabled on the server you must use the -u -pw option. Also might be a good idea to add the site to your Local Intranet Security zone in Internet Explorer.
To try and save a site by looking at the databases would probably be very hard since everything is stored in different tables in the configuration and content database.
Regards,
Thomas