In Hesiod’s Greek myth, a pithos held Pandora’s troubles, not a box.
A pithos was a large storage jar used in ancient Greece for commodities such as grain, wine, and olive oil. Hesiod’s Greek word is pithos, and his account does not describe the container as a small hinged box. The familiar “Pandora’s box” wording developed later through translation and retelling.
The story appears most fully in Hesiod’s Works and Days. Pandora opens the container, releasing illnesses, toil, and other hardships into the human world; only Elpis, commonly translated as hope, remains inside. The jar’s size makes the image different from the compact box often shown in modern illustrations.
A common mix-up is treating “pithos” as merely another word for any Greek vase. It specifically refers to a large storage jar, often made of pottery and sometimes taller than a person. The container’s identification is therefore an important clue to how later European versions reshaped the myth.