Neith was a goddess of unclear origin, sometimes attributed to the northwestern desert or to Libya. She had a warlike nature since Predynastic times.

Some Egyptologists believe that before the unification Neith was the main Goddess of Lower Egypt, and so therefore Her badge, the Red Crown of reeds (also called Neith) became the contribution of Lower Egypt to the Double Crown.

Neith's symbol of two arrows and a bow was often shown in Predynastic pottery. Later she would also sometimes be shown with a weaver's shuttle.

Neith was often titled "She Who Saw Tem's Birth" and so thought of as a potential womb of creation. In very late times she would be seen as the "Great Dark Mother" of the Greeks and Romans and also the motherless virgin warrior embodied in their goddesses Athena and Diana. At all times, Neith was understood to be mysterious and abstract.

Neith's city of Sais became a cosmopolitan center and capital of Egypt during the Late Dynasties Period, especially in the rule of the Saite pharaohs of the 24th Dynasty. Her role as the national goddess flourished.

From this time and on into the Greco-Roman Period Neith was considered to be the wife of Khnum. Their temple at Esna contains many depictions of her along with mummified "lates-fish", (the Nile Perch Lates niloticus), sacred to her cult.