Athene equated with Neith
"In the Egyptian Delta, at the head of which the river Nile divides,
there is a certain district which is called the district of Sais, and
the great city of the district is also called Sais, and is the city
from which King Amasis came. The citizens have a deity for their
foundress; she is called in the Egyptian tongue Neith, and is asserted
by them to be the same whom the Hellenes call Athene; they are great
lovers of the Athenians, and say that they are in some way related to
them." - Plato, Timaeus 21e
Interpretation of the hieroglyphs in the temple of Athene at Sais
"At Saïs in the vestibule of the temple of Athena was carved a babe and
an aged man, and after this a hawk, and next a fish, and finally an
hippopotamus. The symbolic meaning of this was: 'O ye that are coming
into the world and departing from it, God hateth shamelessness.' The
babe is the symbol of coming into the world and the aged man the symbol
of departing from it, and by a hawk they indicate God, by the fish
hatred, as has already been said, because of the sea, and by the
hippopotamus shamelessness; for it is said that he kills his sire and
forces his mother to mate with him." - Plutarch, On Isis and Osiris 32
Athene came from Libya
"When I saw that the statue of Athena in Athens had blue eyes I found
out that the legend about them is Libyan. For the Libyans have a saying
that the Goddess is the daughter of Poseidon and Lake Tritonis, and for
this reason has blue eyes like Poseidon." -Pausanias 1.14.6
Athene helped Perseus in Libya
"A wild Libyan woman reached
Lake Tritonis, and harried the neighbours until Perseus killed her;
Athena was supposed to have helped him in this exploit, because the
people who live around Lake Tritonis are sacred to her." -Pausanias
2.21.6
Athene equated with Neith
"The goddess you Egyptians of Sais have in common with the Athenians, who is called Neith by you, but Athene by them.” Epistles of Apollonius of Tyana 70
Festival of Athene at Sais
"The Egyptians hold solemn
assemblies not once a year, but often. The third greatest festival is
at Saïs in honor of Athena." - Herodotus 2.59
Festival of Athene in Libya
"Next to the Makhlyes are the Auseans; these and the Makhlyes,
separated by the Triton, live on the shores of Lake Tritonis. The
Makhlyes wear their hair long behind, the Auseans in front. They
celebrate a yearly festival of Athena, where their maidens are
separated into two bands and fight each other with stones and sticks,
thus, they say, honoring in the way of their ancestors that native
goddess whom we call Athena. Maidens who die of their wounds are called
false virgins. Before the girls are set fighting, the whole people
choose the fairest maid, and arm her with a Korinthian helmet and Greek
panoply, to be then mounted on a chariot and drawn all along the lake
shore. With what armor they equipped their maidens before Greeks came
to live near them, I cannot say; but I suppose the armor was Egyptian;
for I maintain that the Greeks took their shield and helmet from Egypt.
As for Athena, they say that she was daughter of Poseidon and Lake
Tritonis, and that, being for some reason angry at her father, she gave
herself to Zeus, who made her his own daughter. Such is their tale. The
intercourse of men and women there is promiscuous; they do not cohabit
but have intercourse like cattle. When a woman's child is well grown,
the men assemble within three months and the child is adjudged to be
that man's whom it is most like." - Herodotus 4.180
Egyptians say Athene is the air
“The Egyptians called the air
Athena, whom they believed to be the daughter of Zeus and always a
virgin, because the air is incorruptible and reaches the summit of the
universe, for Athena had issued from the head of Zeus. She is also
called Tritogeneia, from the three changes experienced by nature in the
three seasons of the year – spring, summer, and winter. She bears the
name of glaucopis,
not because her eyes are blue, as certain among the Greeks believed,
but because the immensity of the atmosphere has a blueish tint." -
Diodorus Siculus 1.12
Minerva equated with Neith
"I have already mentioned one
Minerva, mother of Apollo. Another, who is worshipped at Sais, a city
in Egypt, sprung from Nilus." - Cicero, De Natura Deorum 3.23
Athene the heavens
When they mean mother, or sight, or boundaries, or foreknowledge, or
the year, or the heavens, or pity, or Athene, or Hera; they draw a
vulture. A mother, since there is no male in this species of animal …
Athene and Hera, since it seems to the Egyptians that Athene rules over
the upper hemishphere of heaven and Hera over the lower. Wherefore they
hold it absurd that the heavens should be male; female are the heavens.
For the generation of the sun and moon and the rest of the stars is
accomplished in such a way that it is the work of the female. And the
race of vultures, as was said above, is female only. Because of this
the Egyptians place the vulture as a crown on all female figures,
wherefore the Egyptians extend the word to all goddesses.” – Horapollo,
Hieroglyphika 1.11
Athene androgynous
“To symbolize Hephaistos they draw a beetle and a vulture. And Athene,
a vulture and a beetle. For the universe seems to them to be made up of
the male and the female. And they draw a vulture in place of Athene,
for only these gods among them are hermaphroditic.” – Horapollo, Hieroglyphika 1.12
There was a "village of Athêna," in the Faiyum and a city Athenâs.
One of the streets in Alexandria was named after Athena Khalkioikos (H. I. Bell, Archiv, vii pp22 ff.)
