Hesiod used the Greek word pithos for Pandora’s large storage vessel. A pithos was a substantial earthenware jar used in ancient Greece for storing commodities such as grain, oil, and wine.
The pithos detail matters because the familiar phrase “Pandora’s box” does not describe the object in Hesiod’s original Greek account. The myth in Works and Days refers to a vessel large enough to function as a storage container, not a hinged box. The later box image became dominant in European retellings and translations.
A pithos was generally much larger than the portable amphora often shown in modern illustrations. It could be placed in a storeroom or partly buried for stability. Its practical association with storage makes the myth’s release of evils especially vivid: the contents are imagined as things held together until the seal is broken.
Other Greek vessels had different shapes and purposes. A krater mixed wine and water, a lekythos commonly held oil, and an amphora was a two-handled storage jar. These are not the specific term used by Hesiod.