ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the issue of virginity as a mark of chastity, which was used as an antidote to premarital sex, a panacea to adultery, the sustenance of family life, and the protector of the society. It examines the methods adopted to establish it in the precolonial period for the common good of the community using the Yoruba people of southwest Nigeria. Through the use of oral interviews, archival materials, and literature, the study finds that the building of an individual’s marital life on sanctity was through the woman, that she would be married into the family in order to ensure peace, cohesion, and security, hence the importance of women’s virginity to the society’s developmental purposes in precolonial Yorubaland. The study also reveals the gradual transformation of the Yoruba society to Western-oriented culture through social, economic, and political factors brought by the activities of Christian missionaries. The study concludes that female chastity in family life is essential for the common good of the society, and if it is reenacted, it would definitely make a tremendous contribution to the social, economic, and political development of African society. The incessant cases of corruption, insecurity, insurgency, and militancy that pervaded African countries will be reduced drastically.
