In Greek and Roman mythology, Galatea is the post-antique name popularly applied to the ivory (or alabaster) statue carved and loved by Pygmalion of Cyprus, which Aphrodite brought to life. In surviving classical sources the statue has no proper name; "Galatea" became established by eighteenth-century writers and is now inextricably tied to the figure. She is not the Nereid Galatea beloved of Acis.
Adapted from Wikipedia, "Galatea (mythological statue)" · CC BY-SA 4.0
I.Name
No extant ancient text gives the statue a proper name. As late as 1763, Falconet's sculpture at the Paris Salon was titled Pygmalion at the feet of his statue that comes to life. According to Meyer Reinhold, the name Galatea gained wide circulation through Jean-Jacques Rousseau's 1762 scène lyrique Pygmalion, borrowing a pastoral commonplace already familiar from the Acis and Galatea myth.
II.Myth
The story appeared earliest in Philostephanus' Hellenistic history of Cyprus and is retold in Ovid's Metamorphoses: Pygmalion falls in love with a statue he has crafted; Aphrodite answers his prayers, brings the figure to life, and unites the couple in marriage.
Their child Paphus became the eponym of the Cypriot city of Paphos; some accounts also name Metharme. The Bibliotheke mentions a daughter Metharme, wife of Cinyras and mother of Adonis in one genealogical strand, though Myrrha is more commonly named as Adonis' mother.
III.Homonym caution
This living statue must not be confused with Galatea the Nereid, beloved of the shepherd Acis and pursued by the Cyclops Polyphemus.