In Hesiod’s Pandora story, Hermes gives Pandora deceptive speech and a deceitful character. His contribution is part of a larger sequence in which several gods equip or shape the new woman.
Hermes is the Olympian messenger and a god associated with communication, boundaries, travel, trade, and cunning. Those associations help explain why Hesiod assigns him a role involving speech and deception. The story does not make Hermes Pandora’s maker: Hephaestus shapes her, while Athena and Aphrodite provide other gifts.
This episode is often simplified into the claim that every god gives Pandora a physical gift, but Hesiod’s account includes qualities and behavioral traits as well as adornments. Hermes’s role also contributes to the story’s strongly negative ancient portrayal of Pandora, which differs from many modern reinterpretations that present her as curious, independent, or unjustly blamed.