In Hesiod’s Greek myth, evils escape from Pandora’s container after she opens it. Works and Days describes the container as holding destructive troubles that had previously been kept away from human life.
After the lid is lifted, the evils fly out and spread among humanity. Hope remains inside, although Hesiod’s wording has prompted centuries of debate about whether hope is a comfort withheld, a resource preserved, or part of the container’s broader symbolism.
The familiar expression “Pandora’s box” is technically a later mistranslation or adaptation. Hesiod uses the Greek word pithos, generally understood as a large storage jar, not a small box. Renaissance writers helped establish the box wording that became standard in European languages.
The myth is often summarized as a story about curiosity, but Hesiod presents it within a larger account of Zeus’s punishment of humanity after Prometheus gave humans fire. Pandora’s opening of the jar explains why suffering exists in the human world.