Pandora (mythology)/Definition

From Greek mythology, she was the first woman. She wasn't named in the Theogony by the Greek writer Hesiod, but in Works and Days she is a gift from the gods to Epimetheus. Her jar (not a box) contained all of the evils of the world along with hope; she opened the jar and released the evils (including suffering, pain, death.) In later mythology of other cultures, she is identified with a character who opens a giant box, releasing evil into the world.