Which Renaissance scholar helped popularize the phrase “Pandora’s box” in Europe?

Desiderius Erasmus helped popularize the phrase “Pandora’s box” in Europe.

The expression comes from the Greek myth in which Pandora opens a container and releases troubles into the human world. In the original Greek tradition, the container is generally described as a large storage jar, or pithos, rather than a small box.

The word “box” became established partly through a Latin translation associated with Renaissance scholarship. Erasmus, the Dutch humanist and theologian, included the expression in his Adagia, a major collection of classical proverbs and sayings first published in 1500.

Modern English uses “to open Pandora’s box” figuratively for starting a process that creates many unexpected problems. The phrase therefore reflects both an ancient myth and the later transmission of Greek stories through Latin and Renaissance literary culture.