In Hesiod’s Works and Days, Zeus ordered Hephaestus to create Pandora. The act forms part of Zeus’s punishment of humanity after Prometheus stole fire and gave it to mortals.
Hephaestus made Pandora from earth, and the other gods supplied her with qualities and gifts. Hermes, for example, is associated with giving her a deceptive or deceitful mind in Hesiod’s account. Zeus then sent her to Epimetheus, Prometheus’s brother.
Prometheus had warned Epimetheus not to accept gifts from Zeus, but Epimetheus accepted Pandora. In the subsequent story, Pandora opens the container kept in the household, releasing troubles into the human world.
The myth is not simply a story about curiosity. Hesiod uses Pandora to explain why human beings experience suffering while also describing marriage, labor, and the complicated consequences of divine power.