There are several versions of this story in Greek mythology, but I am writing about the ones which I found most interesting. Prometheus, and his brother Epimetheus, were both titans, who were not sent to, or in some accounts, rescued from Tartarus (Titans’ prison) as they chose not to fight the Olympians, led by Zeus during the Titanomachy. Prometheus was obviously not very fond of Zeus and once tried to trick him. This is known as the 'Trick at Mecone'.

When Zeus ordered that humans must offer a portion of the meat they slaughter, to the Olympians, Prometheus slew an Ox and wrapped all the meat in the Ox's grotesque stomach, and wrapped the bones in glistening fat, and asked Zeus to choose. Zeus got tricked, and chose the latter, which appeared better. This later led to humans only burning fat and bones as offerings to Zeus and keeping the meat for themselves. Angered by this, Zeus chose to take away fire from mankind, so that they have to eat the meat raw, but Prometheus went and lit a torch from the Sun and gave fire back to mankind.

Another account of this, is that Prometheus and Epimetheus were assigned the task to provide all living beings with gifts so that they could survive. When humans’ turn came, Epimetheus ran out of all the good things to assign, like claws and fur, and nothing worthy was left to provide to mankind. Prometheus, feeling sad for the humans, gave humans a straight spine, allowing them to stand straight like the Olympians, and then went to Olympus to steal the fire, to gift it to the humans. He threw a golden apple, labelled “for the most beautiful goddess”. His plan worked just as he thought, and a fight ensued among all the goddesses for the apple’s claim, which grabbed everyone’s attention. During this, Prometheus sneaked to the workshop of Hephaistos and Athena on Mount Olympus, stole fire, and gifted it to the humans. He also later taught them how to do metalwork using that fire, thus, becoming associated with science and craftsmanship. Not wanting to give any powerful thing to the humans, Zeus was outraged by this.

Zeus decided to punish both humans, and Prometheus. As his punishment, Zeus took Prometheus far east, where no one could find him, and tied him to a rock. Then Zeus sent an eagle, which would eat Prometheus’ liver. But his liver would regenerate everyday, and the eagle would come to eat it, till eternity (This is depicted in the cover pic of this story). To punish humans, Zeus asked Hephaistos, to craft the first woman, a beautiful being, called Pandora, and asked all the Olympians to gift her with something. She received the gifts of wisdom, beauty, kindness, peace, generosity, and health. But Zeus gifted her a box, and warned her never to open it. Prometheus had warned Epimetheus not to accept any gifts from Zeus, but lost in her beauty, Epimetheus accepted Pandora. Crafted to be curious, Pandora couldn’t stop herself from opening the box. As soon as she opened it, horrible things flew out of the box. Greed, plague, envy, hunger, pain, poverty, war, and death, all of life’s miseries had been let out into the world. Hence, the infamous term “Pandora’s Box” came into being. Something that ought to remain closed and untouched.

Prometheus was luckily rescued by Zeus’ son, the legendary warrior, Hercules himself, who broke his chains and shot the eagle with his arrow. Humans on the other hand, weren’t as lucky, and to date, suffer from all the hardships that came out of Pandora’s Box.