Pandora

• 1. Hesiodic Origins And Variants

  ›

  In the 8th century BCE, Hesiod wrote lines 560 through 612 of his poem Theogony. He described a woman created by Hephaestus on Zeus's orders without ever naming her directly. This figure was a beautiful evil whose descendants would torment humanity. Athena dressed her in a silvery gown and an embroidered veil. She wore garlands and an ornate crown of silver. When she appeared before gods and mortals, wonder seized them all. Yet she remained sheer guile that men could not withstand. Hesiod elaborated that from her came the race of women who live among mortal men to their great trouble. These women were no helpmeets in hateful poverty but only in wealth. Men who avoided marriage with such women reached deadly old age alone. Their kinsfolk divided their possessions after death. Occasionally a man found a good wife, yet evil still contended with good.

  45

• 2. Etymology And Name Interpretations

  ›

  A white-ground kylix painted by the Tarquinia painter around 470, 460 BC bears the name Anesidora above a female figure. This inscription means she who sends up gifts. Scholars debate whether Pandora meant all-gifted or all-giving. William E. Phipps noted that classics scholars suggest Hesiod reversed the meaning of an earth goddess called Pandora. Jane Ellen Harrison observed that a fifth-century amphora shows Pandora rising from the ground as a chthonic goddess like Gaia herself. A winged ker with a fillet hovers overhead while her arms are raised in epiphany gesture. Harrison argued this represents a shift from matriarchy to patriarchy in Greek culture. The life-bringing goddess Pandora was eclipsed by the death-bringing human woman. Robert Graves quoted Harrison and asserted that the Hesiodic episode is not a genuine myth but an anti-feminist fable. H. J. Rose wrote that the myth makes Pandora the origin of all Man's woes with her being the exemplification of the bad wife.

  211

• 3. The Jar Versus Box Translation

  ›

  Hesiod's original text refers to a pithos, which is a very large jar made of rough-grained terra cotta used for storage. These jars were often half-buried in the ground for wine, oil, or grain. Erasmus of Rotterdam translated pithos into the Latin word pyxis meaning box during the 16th century. This mistranslation has endured ever since despite the original object being a massive container. The phrase Pandora's box appears in modern language because of this single translation choice. Jane Ellen Harrison traced the transformation of this term back to Lilius Giraldus of Ferrara in his Historiarum Deorum Syntagma published in 1580. A pithos could also refer to a funerary jar as seen on a lekythos from the University Museum of Jena. That vase-painting shows a large pithos sunk deep into the ground serving as a grave. Souls escaped from such grave-jars and returned to them according to Greek ideas familiar to every citizen.

  67

• 4. Artistic Representations Through Centuries

  ›

  Images of Pandora began appearing on Greek pottery as early as the 5th century BCE though identification remains ambiguous sometimes. An Attic red-figure vase-painter showed the upper part of Pandora rising from the earth like a chthonic goddess. John D. Batten painted hammer-wielding workmen through a doorway while Hephaestus brooded over an unanimated figure in 1913. Louis Laguerre decorated a ceiling at Petworth House with a scene about 1720 showing gods presenting gifts to newly created Pandora. William Etty painted Pandora Crowned by the Seasons a century later as an apotheosis among clouds. James Barry labored over his huge Birth of Pandora for over a decade at the turn of the 19th century. His early drawing preserved only in Luigi Schiavonetti's print follows Hesiod's account closely. The actual painting showed a subordinated Pandora surrounded by gift-bearing gods while Minerva stood near her demonstrating feminine arts proper to her passive role. Sculptures followed including Henri-Joseph Ruxthiel in 1819, John Gibson in 1856, Pierre Loison in 1861 and Chauncy Bradley Ives in 1871.

  310161920

• 5. Comparisons With Biblical Eve

  ›

  A theological commonplace going back to the early Church Fathers equated the Classical myth of Pandora with Eve. Each is the first woman in the world and each brings suffering after transgression of divine law. Bishop Jean Olivier published a long Latin poem titled Pandora in 1541 demonstrating that woman draws men to sin. Two French translations appeared shortly after in 1542 and 1548. Leonhard Culmann wrote a five-act tragedy Ein schön weltlich Spiel von der schönen Pandora in 1544 teaching conventional Christian morality. Jean Cousin the Elder painted Eva Prima Pandora in 1550 showing a naked woman reclining in a grotto. Her right elbow rests on a skull indicating death while she holds an apple branch. Her left arm is wreathed by a snake resting on an unstopped jar which is Pandora's attribute. Juan de Horozco's Spanish emblem book Emblemas morales from 1589 condemns female curiosity and desire to learn. Nicolas Regnier's painting The Allegory of Vanity dated 1626 subtitled Pandora typifies her curiosity about contents just unstopped.

  823

• 6. Dramatic Adaptations In Literature

  ›

  Pedro Calderón de la Barca composed La Estatua de Prometeo in 1670 making devotion to learning contrast with active life. Prometheus molds a clay statue of Minerva giving it life from stolen sunbeam. Voltaire wrote an unproduced opera Pandore in 1740 where Jupiter falls in love with new creation but Destiny prevents consummation. Charles-Pierre Colardeau published erotic poem Les Hommes de Prométhée in 1774 presenting Pandora equally as love-object and unfallen Eve. Aumale de Corsenville created one-act verse melodrama Pandore performed on the 2nd of July 1789 on the eve of French Revolution. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote lyrical dramatic fragment between 1807 and 1808 revolving round Epimetheus longing for return of wife who abandoned him. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow published The Masque of Pandora in 1876 beginning with her creation refusal by Prometheus acceptance by Epimetheus. James Robinson Planché wrote Olympic Revels or Prometheus and Pandora in 1831 as first Victorian burlesque peppered with comic banter and songs. Gabriel Fauré composed ambitious opera Prométhée in 1900 using huge orchestra and outdoor amphitheatre.

  3435383942