What was the container in the original Greek story of Pandora?

The container in the original Greek story of Pandora was a pithos, a large storage jar.

Hesiod’s Works and Days describes Pandora receiving a large vessel, but it does not call it a box. A pithos was a substantial earthenware jar used in the ancient Greek world to store goods such as grain, oil, or wine. Some pithoi were large enough to stand taller than a person.

The familiar phrase “Pandora’s box” developed later because a translation or copying error rendered the Greek word for jar as a box. The error became widely established in European languages, so the inaccurate name is now much more familiar than the original object.

This detail matters because the vessel was not necessarily a small container designed to be carried. In the myth, it functions as a household storage jar holding the troubles released into the world. The original jar-and-lid image also connects the story to everyday Greek material culture.