In Hesiod’s Works and Days, what quality did Hermes give Pandora?

In Hesiod’s Works and Days, Hermes gave Pandora a deceptive character.

Hermes contributes speech and a temperament associated with deceit in Hesiod’s description of Pandora. This detail is easy to miss because modern summaries usually focus on the container and the troubles released from it. The story’s Pandora is assembled through several divine contributions, and the gifts are not all positive.

The role suits Hermes’s complex place in Greek mythology. He is the divine messenger and a patron of communication, trade, travel, and cunning. In the Pandora story, his contribution helps present her as persuasive and potentially misleading, reinforcing Zeus’s plan to make humanity suffer after Prometheus’s theft of fire.

Translations do not always use the same wording. Depending on the edition, Hermes gives Pandora a “shameless mind,” “a deceitful nature,” or a similar quality, along with speech. These phrases describe the same general idea, but an answer should not confuse this gift with the physical beauty supplied by Aphrodite or the craft training supplied by Athena.