Which ancient Greek poem is the earliest surviving literary source for the Pandora myth?

The earliest surviving literary source for the Pandora myth is Hesiod’s Works and Days.

Hesiod composed this Greek didactic poem around the late eighth or early seventh century BCE. The work combines advice about farming and justice with stories explaining humanity’s difficult condition, including the arrival of Pandora and the release of evils from her container.

Hesiod also discusses Pandora in the Theogony, but Works and Days gives the fuller narrative. In that version, Zeus sends Pandora as part of his punishment after Prometheus steals fire for humans. The story is therefore connected to both the origins of toil and the relationship between gods and mortals.

A common mistake is to treat Pandora’s Box as the title of an ancient Greek text. That phrase is much later; Hesiod describes a jar, not a box, and the poem’s title is Works and Days.