In Greek mythology, evils escaped from Pandora’s container.
Hesiod describes the jar as holding harmful forces or troubles that had been kept inside. Once Pandora opened it, these afflictions spread among human beings. The episode serves as a mythic explanation for why suffering is part of ordinary human existence.
Translations differ in the exact nouns used for the contents. English versions may say evils, illnesses, sorrows, or miseries, but “evils” is the broad canonical answer. These are not usually presented as physical animals or named monsters escaping from a locked chest.
The story is connected to the punishment of humanity after Prometheus’s theft of fire. Pandora’s opening is therefore part of a sequence involving divine power, human curiosity or vulnerability, and the arrival of hardships in the mortal world.