Pandora is presented as the first woman in the Greek myth told by Hesiod. Her creation follows Prometheus’s theft of fire and forms part of Zeus’s punishment of humanity.
In Works and Days, Zeus has the gods make Pandora and endow her with beauty, clothing, skills, speech, and a deceptive character. The myth therefore explains humanity’s suffering through a story about the arrival of woman, labor, and troubles among mortals.
Pandora is sometimes described in modern retellings as a goddess, but Hesiod presents her as a woman created by the gods, not as an Olympian deity. She is also sometimes portrayed as intentionally disobedient, although the oldest surviving account does not simply present her as a curious person opening a container.
The familiar English phrase “Pandora’s box” comes from later translation history. Hesiod’s original term refers to a large jar, while the identity of Pandora herself remains consistent across the story’s major retellings.