In Hesiod’s Pandora story, hope was the last thing left inside her opened container. After Pandora releases the troubles held within it, hope remains behind.
The detail comes from the ending of the episode in Works and Days. Pandora closes the container before hope escapes, leaving humanity with a continuing possibility of endurance despite the evils that have spread through the world.
The Greek word often translated as “hope” is elpis. Interpreters have long debated whether the story presents hope as a blessing, a consolation, or something deliberately retained within the container. The text itself is brief, so later writers have supplied different philosophical readings.
The familiar phrase “Pandora’s box” is also a later wording. Hesiod describes a storage vessel, commonly identified with the Greek word pithos. The surviving hope is the best-known final detail of the myth.