Jump to content

Galatea (mythology)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For other uses, seeGalatea (Greek myth).
"Metharme" redirects here. For the plant genus, seeMetharme (plant).
Falconet's 1763 sculpturePygmalion and Galatea(Walters Art Museum,Baltimore)

Galatea(/ˌɡæləˈtiːə/;Greek:Γαλάτεια;"she who is milk-white" )[1]is the post-antiquity name popularly applied to the statue carved of ivory alabaster byPygmalionofCyprus,which then came to life inGreek mythology.

Galatea is also the name of a sea-nymph, one of the fiftyNereids(daughters ofNereus) mentioned byHesiodandHomer.[2]InTheocritusIdylls VIandXIshe is the object of desire of the one-eyed giantPolyphemusand is linked with Polyphemus again in the myth ofAcis and GalateainOvid'sMetamorphoses.[3]She is also mentioned inVirgil'sEcloguesandAeneid.[4]

Etymology

[edit]

Though the name "Galatea" has become so firmly associated with Pygmalion's statue as to seem antique, its use in connection with Pygmalion originated with a post-classical writer. No extant ancient text mentions the statue's name,[5][6]althoughPausaniasmentions a statue of Calm,Galene(Ancient Greek:Γαλήνη).[7]As late as 1763, a sculpture of the subject shown byFalconetat theParis Salon(see illustration) carried the titlePygmalion aux pieds de sa statue qui s'anime( "Pygmalion at the feet of his statue that comes to life" ). That sculpture, currently at theWalters Art MuseuminBaltimore,now bears the expected modern titlePygmalion and Galatea.

According toMeyer Reinhold,the name "Galatea" was first given wide circulation inJean-Jacques Rousseau'sscène lyriqueof 1762,Pygmalion.The name had become a commonplace ofpastoralfictions, because of the well-known myth ofAcis and Galatea;one ofHonoré d'Urfé's characters inL'Astréewas a Galatea, though not this sculptural creation.

Myth

[edit]

The story of Pygmalion appeared earliest in aHellenisticwork,Philostephanus'history of Cyprus, "De Cypro".[8]It is retold in Ovid'sMetamorphoses,[9]where the king Pygmalion is made into a sculptor who fell in love with a marble statue he had crafted with his own hands. In answer to his prayers, the goddessAphroditebrought it to life and united the couple in marriage. This novella remained the classical telling until the end of the seventeenth century. Thetropeof the animated statue gained a vogue during the eighteenth century.[10]

Thedaemonof Pygmalion's goddess, animating hercult image,bore him a sonPaphus—theeponymof the city ofPaphos—and Metharme. Of "this ecstatic relationship", Meyer Reinhold has remarked, "there may be lurking a survival of the ancient cult of theGreat Goddessand her consort ".[6]

Cinyras,perhaps the son of Paphus,[11]or perhaps the successful suitor of Metharme, founded the city of Paphos on Cyprus, under the patronage of Aphrodite, and built the great temple to the goddess there.[12]

Bibliotheke,the Hellenistic compendium of myth long attributed to Apollodorus, mentions a daughter of Pygmalion named Metharme.[13]She was the wife of Cinyras, and the mother ofAdonis,beloved of Aphrodite, althoughMyrrha,daughter of Cinyras, is more commonly named as the mother of Adonis.

It was commonly rumored in Roman times thatPraxiteles's cult image ofAphrodite of KnidosinAphrodite's templewas so beautiful that at least one admirer arranged to beshut in with it overnight.[14]

Interpretation

[edit]

The myth indicates that a cult image ofAphroditewas instrumental in some way in thefounding mythof Paphos. It also seems axiomatic, apart from miraculous intervention, that the living representative of a cult image could be none but the chief priestess.Robert Gravesgives a socio-political interpretation of the story, as a mythologized overthrow of a matrilineal cult. In his view Pygmalion, the consort of the goddess's priestess at Paphos, kept thecult imageof Aphrodite as a means of retaining power during his term, after which, Graves speculates, he refused to give up the goddess's image "and that he prolonged this by marriage with another of Aphrodite's priestesses—technically his daughter, since she was heiress to the throne—who is called Metharme (" change "), to mark the innovation".[15]

William Moulton Marstondrew inspiration from the Galatea and Pygmalion myth in creating his allegorical myth ofWonder Woman's clay birth, withHippolytebeing in the "Pygmalion" role sculpting her daughterWonder Woman(as the "Galatea" ) from clay and given life by Aphrodite's breath. It was Marston's intention to express the creative power of a mother's love for a child and that Wonder Woman is the product of her mother's rearing, and therefore personifying much of her mother's qualities of independence, self sufficiency, strength of character, non-limiting beliefs, etc.[citation needed]

See also

[edit]

Notes and references

[edit]
  1. ^Galene in the Smith Classics DictionaryArchived2007-10-13 at theWayback Machine.The suffix-teiaor-theiameans "goddess",as in other Nereid names: Amatheia, Psamathe, Leukotheia, Pasitheia, etc. Hesiod has both a Galene (" Calm-Sea ") and a Galateia named asNereids.Galateia as "sea-calm Goddess" seems a likely inference; the reasoning for Galateia as Milky-White comes from the adjectival form ofgalaktos, galakteia.
  2. ^Hesiod,Theogony250; Homer,Iliad,18.45.
  3. ^Ovid,Met.13.738, 13.789.
  4. ^Virgil,Ec.1.30, 1.31, 3.64, 3.72, 7.37, 9.39,Aen.9.103.
  5. ^Helen H. Law, "The name Galatea in the Pygmalion myth",The Classical Journal,27(1932), pp. 337–342
  6. ^abReinhold, Meyer(May 1971). "The Naming of Pygmalion's Animated Statue".The Classical Journal.66(4): 316–319.JSTOR3296568.Reinhold notes that the first edition of Lemprière'sBibliotheca Classica(1788), does not have an entry for "Galatea", which was inserted in later editions.
  7. ^Pausanias,Description of Greece2.1.9
  8. ^Reinhold 1971,p. 316.
  9. ^Metamorphosesx.243ff.
  10. ^J.L. Carr, "Pygmalion and thephilosophes:the animated statue in eighteenth-century France "Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes23(1960), pp. 239–255.
  11. ^According to the RomanHyginus,Fabula142, Cinyras was a son of Paphus, thus legitimate in the patrineal manner, butBibliothekemakes Cinyras an interloper, arriving with some of his people fromSyriaon the nearest coast of Asia, thus a suitor from outside, in the matrilineal manner; the conflict is instructive.
  12. ^Hamilton, Edith(1969) [1940]. "Eight Brief Tales of Lovers".Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes(Renewal ed.). New York:Mentor Books.pp. 112–115.ISBN0-451-62803-9.
  13. ^Bibliotheke,iii.14.3.
  14. ^Recorded in the second-century dialogueErotesthat is traditionally misattributed toLucian of Samosata.
  15. ^Graves, Robert(1960).The Greek Myths.p. 64.1.ISBN0-14-017199-1.
[edit]
Wikimedia Commons has media related toGalatea (nymph).


Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Galatea_(mythology)&oldid=1224413494"