Galatea (Greek myth)

In Greek mythology, Galatea (/ˌɡæləˈtiːə/; Greek: Γαλάτεια; "she who is milk-white")[1] was the name of the following figures:

• Galatea, a Nereid who loved the shepherd Acis.[2]
• Galatea, the statue of a woman created by Pygmalion.[3]
• Galatea, daughter of Eurytius, son of Sparton. Her husband Lamprus wished to have a son and told her to expose the child if it turned out to be a girl. So when Galatea gave birth to a girl she asked the gods to change her sex, and Leto turned her into a boy (Leucippus)[4]

References

1. Galene in the Smith Classics Dictionary Archived 2007-10-13 at the Wayback Machine. The suffix -teia or -theia means "goddess", as in other Nereid names: Amatheia, Psamathe, Leukotheia, Pasitheia, etc. Hesiod has both a Galene ("Calm-Sea") and a Galateia named as Nereids. Galateia as "sea-calm Goddess" seem a likely inference; the reasoning for Galateia as Milky-White comes from the adjectival form of galaktos, galakteia.
2. Hesiod, Theogony; Homer, Iliad.
3. Metamorphoses x.243ff.
4. Antoninus Liberalis, Metamorphoses, 17, with reference to Nicander