Pandora is the Greek name commonly translated as “all-gifted” in Hesiod’s myth.
The name comes from the Greek elements pan, meaning “all,” and doron, meaning “gift.” Hesiod presents Pandora as a woman fashioned by the gods, with each deity contributing a quality or adornment. Her name therefore emphasizes the collective gifts bestowed upon her rather than identifying a single divine parent.
Pandora appears most fully in Hesiod’s Works and Days, composed in archaic Greece. The story connects her creation with Zeus’s punishment of humanity after Prometheus stole fire. Later retellings often call her container a box, but Hesiod describes a large storage jar. The phrase “Pandora’s box” became standard much later through translation and artistic tradition.
The name is sometimes interpreted as “all-giver,” because the Greek wording can suggest one who gives all. In the myth’s usual modern interpretation, however, “all-gifted” is the conventional translation describing the gifts she received from the gods.