Pandora

Pandora was the first woman in Greek mythology, a sort of an Ancient Greek Eve. Following the instructions of Zeus – who wanted to punish Prometheus for stealing the fire from the gods and giving it to the humans – she was molded from earth by Hephaestus and given gifts by the other Olympian gods. In Hesiod’s Works and Days, she took the lid off a jar that held troubles and diseases, and they spread over the earth; only Hope remained inside (Works and Days 42–105).

The Creation of Pandora

Pandora, the first woman, was created on the order of Zeus as a punishment for Prometheus’ theft of fire. She is not a goddess: Hesiod describes a woman fashioned from earth and water. Hesiod does not name a father or a mother for her; Hephaestus is her maker and Athena teaches her handiwork, and Zeus orders the whole thing.

The Balancing Gift

Hesiod says that Zeus was angry because Prometheus had deceived him, and so Zeus hid the fire. Prometheus stole it back in a hollow fennel stalk. Zeus then answered that, in place of fire, he would give men an evil thing in which all would take pleasure and embrace their own misfortune (Hesiod, Works and Days 47–58; Theogony 565–570).

The Olympians Create Pandora

Zeus ordered Hephaestus to mix earth with water, give the creature a human voice and strength, and make her face like that of the immortal goddesses, a lovely maiden. Athena was to teach her handiwork and the weaving of the elaborate web; Aphrodite was to pour grace on her head, with painful longing and anxieties that wear out the limbs; and Hermes was to put in her a shameless mind and a deceitful nature (Works and Days 60–68); he carried this out, giving her lies, coaxing words and a voice (Works and Days 77–80). Hephaestus molded her at once. Athena dressed and girdled her, the Graces and Persuasion (Peitho) put golden necklaces on her, and the Seasons crowned her with spring flowers (Works and Days 70–76). In the Theogony it is Athena who dresses the woman in a silvery garment and veils her, and Hephaestus himself makes a golden crown for her with many fine figures of animals worked on it (Theogony 571–584).

Pandora, the First Woman

Hermes named the woman Pandora, “All-Gift”, because all the gods who live on Olympus had given her a gift, to be a sorrow to men who eat bread (Works and Days 80–82). In the Theogony she is not named, but Hesiod writes that from her comes the race of women, who live with mortal men as a great trouble: they are no help in hateful poverty, but only share wealth (Theogony 590–593). The gods and men were amazed when they saw the sheer trick that nobody could escape (Theogony 588–589).

The Jar of Pandora (“Pandora’s Box”)

Zeus sent Hermes with the gift to Epimetheus, Prometheus’ brother, who had been warned by Prometheus never to accept a gift from Olympian Zeus, but to send it back. Epimetheus took her, and understood only when he already had the evil (Works and Days 83–89). Hesiod calls Epimetheus the first to accept from Zeus the woman made of clay (Theogony 511–514).

Before this, Hesiod says, the tribes of men lived on the earth free of evils, hard toil and the painful diseases that bring death. Then the woman took the great lid from a jar (pithos, a large storage jar) with her hands and scattered what was inside, and so caused grievous troubles for men. Only Hope stayed there, inside the unbreakable house under the rim of the jar, and did not fly out, because the woman had put the lid back on before it could, by the will of Zeus (Works and Days 90–99). The other countless sorrows wander among men; earth and sea are full of evils, and diseases visit by day and by night in silence, because Zeus took away their voice (Works and Days 100–104).

Hesiod does not say why Pandora lifted the lid, so the later idea that she was curious is not in the poem. The word “box” for the container also does not come from Hesiod, who writes pithos. Whether Hope remaining in the jar is a good or a bad thing is not explained in the poem. The text does not place the opening of the jar at the end of the Golden Age. The Ages of Man are told in a separate passage that follows (Works and Days 106 onwards).

Deucalion and Pyrrha

According to Apollodorus, Pandora, whom he calls the first woman fashioned by the gods, and Epimetheus had a daughter, Pyrrha, who married Deucalion, a son of Prometheus. When Zeus wished to destroy the men of the Bronze Age, Deucalion built a chest on the advice of Prometheus and survived the flood with Pyrrha. When the rains stopped they landed and, following the instructions of Zeus, threw stones over their heads; the stones Deucalion threw became men and those Pyrrha threw became women (Apollodorus, Library 1.7.2).

Pandora Sources

The story of Pandora is told in two slightly different versions in Hesiod’s Theogony (507–514, 565–593) and his Works and Days (42–105). Her daughter Pyrrha appears in Apollodorus, Library 1.7.2. In the Theogony the woman has no name and there is no jar; the name, the jar and Hope are found only in the Works and Days.

See Also: Epimetheus, Prometheus, Ages of Man, Pyrrha, Hephaestus