Pygmalion- Greek FigureMortal"King of Cyprus"

The Sculptor's Obsession

Pygmalion, a sculptor on Cyprus, grew disgusted with mortal women and resolved to live alone. Working in ivory, he carved a female figure so lifelike it seemed on the verge of movement, held back only by modesty. He fell in love with his own creation, bringing it gifts of shells and amber, dressing it in fine robes and laying it upon a couch spread with Tyrian purple. He called the statue his bedfellow.

When the festival of Aphrodite came, Pygmalion brought offerings to her altar. Too ashamed to voice his true desire, he prayed only that his future wife might be like his ivory maiden. Aphrodite understood the wish he dared not speak and caused the altar flames to flare three times.

The Ivory Made Flesh

Returning home, Pygmalion kissed the statue and found its lips warm. He touched it again, and the ivory yielded under his fingers like wax softening in sunlight. He pressed once more, feeling flesh where there had been carved surface. Veins pulsed beneath his thumb. The maiden opened her eyes and saw both the sky and her lover in the same moment. Aphrodite blessed their union, and their son Paphos gave his name to the city sacred to the goddess on Cyprus.

An older tradition, preserved by Clement of Alexandria from Philostephanus of Cyrene, tells of a Cypriot king who fell in love not with a statue he carved but with a cult image of Aphrodite herself.