Hesiod first recorded the Pandora myth in the surviving literary tradition.
The story appears in two works attributed to Hesiod: the Theogony and Works and Days. Hesiod is generally dated to the late eighth or early seventh century BCE, making him one of the earliest known Greek poets. His account supplies the essential framework for Pandora’s creation, marriage to Epimetheus, and the release of troubles from a container.
The two poems do not present exactly the same emphasis. The Theogony gives a compressed account of woman as a destructive race, while Works and Days provides more detail about Pandora’s construction and the jar. Modern versions often blend the two passages into a single continuous narrative.
Homer is also an early Greek epic poet, but the surviving Homeric poems are not the source of the standard Pandora story. Later authors, artists, and translators expanded and reshaped the myth, helping establish the phrase “Pandora’s box.”