Sais was a city on the Nile delta that existed at least from 3000 BC. Diodorus Siculus claimed that Sais had been built by the Athenians before the flood of Deucalion (Histories 5.57). The present settlement is called Sa el Hagar. The Septuagint version of the Bible identifies Sais with Pelusium, mentioned in Ezekiel 30:12-15. During the 7th century BC it became the capital of the pharaohs of the 26th Dynasty.
Sais is the Egyptian city where Solon originally learned of the story of Atlantis. It housed the principal shrine of the Egyptian goddess Neith who has been identified with Athene. The Greek writer Charax of Pergamon (c. 200 AD) reflected this connection when he wrote that the citizens of Sais referred to themselves as Athenai and Diodorus Siculus states that the Athenians claim to have been colonists from Sais.
No remains of the temples, with their celebrated inscribed pillars, have as yet been discovered. However, excavations are proceeding under the sponsorship of the Egypt Exploration Society and the University of Durham led by Dr. Penelope Wilson(b).
The whole matter of the relevance of Sais to the Atlantis story has been challenged by a theory on the Internet(a) that Sais and Tanis were in fact the same location. A starting point is the fact that the current village of Sa el Hagar adjacent to the ruins of Sais has a counterpart at Tanis where there is a village called San el Hagar. Drawing on the writings of Strabo, Herodotus and the Bible the author concludes that the two cities were one.
(a) http://www.specialtyinterests.net/dyn26.html#sais
(b) http://www.dur.ac.uk/penelope.wilson/sais.html
