Taboos in front of Ooni's ex-wives

"Let's talk about sex" is a monster hit released in August 1991 by Salt-N-Pepa, an all-female, Grammy-winning American hip-hop group.

Formed in New York in 1985, Salt-N-Pepa, in their bold song, which is a dialogue about the dangers of unprotected sex, advocates the need to tear off the mask of shyness that society is about sex.

The album was released at a time when people were shy to reveal their HIV/AIDS status, but basketball superstar Magic Johnson had just come out with his HIV status, providing the fire for the song blazes atop billboard charts around the world.

Curiosity kills the cat, not the journalist. In this article, I hope curiosity won't kill me as I poke my nose into ancient palaces to dissect sex and sexuality, not among mortals, but among kings, queens, and concubines who frolic in the whirlwind of marital pleasure.

Let's talk about sex. Something doesn't add up for the wisest of all kings, Solomon, King David's son, to have only three children from 700 wives and 300 bedridden concubines at a time when man had not discovered the wisdom to stop sperm in condom technology.

It was a time when David, the father of Solomon, sang in Psalm 128:3: "Your wife will bear you many children, like a vine that produces much fruit. Your children will bring you much good, like olive branches that produce many olives."

Did Solomon choose to have only three children? Why? Did he become impotent at some point? Did he use his phallic force mainly for pleasure and rarely for procreation? Is the Holy Bible silent about the actual number of Solomon's children? Rhetorical questions.

Do you wonder why a man would marry 700 wives and have 300 concubines? I have an answer. The son, Solomon, fathered by a lustful king, David, who slept with a woman, Bathsheba, whose husband, Uriah, he, David, killed, must have an extraordinary libidinal appetite.

The late king of Afrobeats, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, whose hobby was sex, also had eight children by his first wives, and the 27 wives he married in 1978. Some birds surely know how to fly without perching.

I perch under the eaves of the castle of the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, having just arrived on a flight from the palace of the late Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi. I watch, I listen.

It has been six moons since Iku Baba Yeye transited to join his ancestors in the underworld. The sun has not yet dried the flood of mourning. The palace is still hollow. The beautiful queens of Oba Adeyemi can no longer obtain the royal heat that consumes coital pleasure. And the rains are here. So what happens to bereaved queens? Can they remarry?

At the eaves of Ife Palace, I listen, I watch. I see Ooni Ogunwusi sitting in his imperial majesty. A fair-skinned young girl walks through the large doors, the king smiles and nods her to a room to the right. After a while, another fair-skinned girl enters, Kabiyesi smiles again and waves her irukere (horsetail) to a room to the left. Shortly after, a third fair-skinned girl struts around and Kabiyesi directs her to a room down the hall.

I thought the Kabiyesi would stop at three because three is a powerful number in the metaphysical realm, symbolizing the trinity and the three divisions of the day. The ancients also say that the iron tripod does not spill the soup, "Àrò mẹ́ta kìí da ọbẹ̀ nù". But I was wrong.

Then a beautiful dark-skinned girl walks through the doors, the Kabiyesi beams, and beckons her to a nearby room. And, one after the other, two fair-skinned maidens entered the palace, the king smiling and nodding towards their respective chambers. I listen, I watch. I see a lot more empty rooms.

I do not envy the six maidens of Oba Ogunwusi's harem because in a house where six women are vying for a man's love, five stars can agree to mitigate the shine of the moon, ashes may be sweeter than salt, the ant may grow bigger than the elephant and rumors of slapping over a parking lot dispute may soon take on the semblance of reality with broken bottles designing young girls skins. So, I will not congratulate them.

By the way, where is the ex-Queen of the Ooni of Benin, Edo State, Zainab Wuraola Otiti Obanor? I learned that the delightful Beninese ex-queen had remarried and moved on with her life since her divorce from the Ooni in August 2017.

Where is ex-Queen Silekunola Naomi of Akure, Ondo State? Nearly a year after her celebrated divorce from Ogunwusi, Naomi has kept a dignified low profile, keeping her love life and social life out of scandal.

There are so many myths about kings and queens. One of them is that an oba's wife can never remarry even if the oba is deceased or divorced. What would happen...