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Kore anesidora5/15/2023 ![]() ![]() The story of Pandora was repeated on Greek ceramics. Jane Ellen Harrison turned to the repertory of vase-painters to shed light on aspects of myth that were left unaddressed or disguised in literature. She would embody the fertility of the earth and its capacity to bear grain and fruits for the benefit of humankind. In a previous incarnation now lost to us, Pandora/Anesidora would have taken on aspects of Gaea and Demeter. Pandora appears to be just such a product of this process. The most famous example of this is the putative division of all the aspects of the so-called Great Goddess into a number of goddesses with more specialized functions-Gaea, Demeter, Persephone, Artemis and Hecate among them. In classical scholarship it is generally posited that-for female deities in particular-one or more secondary mythic entities sometimes “splinter off” (so to speak) from a primary entity, assuming aspects of the original in the process. This connection of Pandora to Gaea and Demeter through the name Anesidora provides a clue as to Pandora’s evolution as a mythic figure. More commonly, however, the epithet anesidora is applied to Gaea or Demeter. Written above this figure (a convention in Greek vase painting) is the name Anesidora. 460 BC) is Anesidora, which similarly means “she who sends up gifts.” This vase painting clearly depicts Hephaestus and Athena putting the finishing touches on the first woman, as in the Theogony. An alternate name for Pandora attested on a white-ground kylix (ca. Pandora properly means “all-giving” rather than “all-gifted.” Certain vase paintings dated to the 5th century BC likewise indicate that the pre-Hesiodic myth of the goddess Pandora endured for centuries after the time of Hesiod. The etymology of Pandora’s name, “all-gifted” provided in Works and Days is an incorrect folk etymology. ![]() He for whom Zeus the lord of thunder mixes the gifts he sends, will meet now with good and now with evil fortune but he to whom Zeus sends none but evil gifts will be pointed at by the finger of scorn, the hand of famine will pursue him to the ends of the world, and he will go up and down the face of the earth, respected neither by gods nor men. ![]() The immortals know no care, yet the lot they spin for man is full of sorrow on the floor of Zeus’ palace there stand two urns, the one filled with evil gifts, and the other with good ones. In the seventh century BC, Hesiod, both in his Theogony (briefly, without naming Pandora outright, line 570) and in Works and Days, gives the earliest literary version of the Pandora story however, there is an older mention of jars or urns containing blessings and evils bestowed upon mankind in Homer’s Iliad: In all literary versions, however, the myth is a kind of theodicy, addressing the question of why there is evil in the world. The myth of Pandora is ancient, appears in several distinct Greek versions, and has been interpreted in many ways. She opened the jar out of simple curiosity and not as a malicious act. According to the myth, Pandora opened a jar (pithos), in modern accounts sometimes mistranslated as “Pandora’s box”, releasing all the evils of mankind - although the particular evils, aside from plagues and diseases, are not specified in detail by Hesiod - leaving only Hope inside once she had closed it again. Her other name, inscribed against her figure on a white-ground kylix in the British Museum, is Anesidora, “she who sends up gifts,” up implying “from below” within the earth. Zeus ordered Hephaestus to mold her out of earth as part of the punishment of mankind for Prometheus‘ theft of the secret of fire, and all the gods joined in offering her “seductive gifts”. As Hesiod related it, each god helped create her by giving her unique gifts. Raat - "Nocturne" EP - 2023 (04/19) Cross Roarr - "Transcendent Chaosophia" - 2023 (04/16) Devil's Flesh - "Evil Gods" - 2023 (04/16) Ardent Nova - "Ardent Nova" - 2023 (04/16) Sete Star Sept - "The Judgment By Reaper" - 2023 (04/15) Perdition Winds - "Burning Spiritual Crypts" - 2023 (04/15) Jesus Piece - ".In Greek mythology, Pandora (“all-gifted”, “all-endowed”) was the first woman. ![]()
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