Around what century BCE did Hesiod compose Works and Days, the earliest surviving Pandora account?

Hesiod composed Works and Days around the 7th century BCE, making it the earliest surviving literary account of Pandora.

Works and Days is an ancient Greek didactic poem traditionally attributed to Hesiod. Modern scholars generally place it in the early seventh century BCE, although the exact date cannot be established with complete precision. The poem combines farming advice, moral instruction, reflections on justice, and stories about humanity’s difficult condition.

Its Pandora passage appears in the wider story of Prometheus and the theft of fire. Hesiod uses the episode to explain why human life includes toil, disease, and other troubles. The poem’s version is earlier than many later artistic and literary retellings, so details familiar today may not belong to Hesiod’s original account.

Works and Days is sometimes confused with Hesiod’s Theogony, another major early Greek poem. Theogony also mentions Pandora-related material, but Works and Days gives the fuller narrative of her creation and arrival among humans.