Many centuries ago there lived a Middle Eastern king called Amurabi, who was exceptionally fond of fruit. Unfortunately, in that part of the world, the summer is very hot, so fruit does not last long once it is picked. So Amurabi summoned his wise men and ordered them to find a way of preserving fruit so that it could be enjoyed all year. As a reward, he promised that anybody who found a suitable preservation method would be given the pick of the royal harem women.

Amurabi, like all kings worthy of the title, had a substantial harem and used to stroll among the ladies every evening, chatting and joking and being fed tasty morsels, until he selected a companion for the night. This was a coveted privilege, as the companion was often given a pretty gift of jewellery or perfume if she pleased Amurabi well.

But one of his newest wives, a shy young maiden named Gilga, was always overlooked because she couldn’t bring herself to compete with the other harem women, who would dance and flutter their eyelashes at him seductively, in order to attract his attention.

Gilga loved Amurabi dearly, however, and longed to share his bed. Eventually she began to despair of ever being noticed by her lord, and began to pine.

Meanwhile, one of the kings’ advisors concluded that it was the sunlight that caused fruit to spoil. He reasoned that the way to preserve fruit was to keep it in a dark place, where the sunlight could not reach it. So he packed two enormous clay jars full of grapes, sealed them with wax and stored them in the cellar.

Eventually, he announced that he was ready to have his theory tested and king Amurabi ordered the grapes to be brought to him. But when the royal taster took a mouthful of the evil looking bubbling mixture in the jars, he gagged and spat and declared the mixture to be poison. He urged Amurabi to throw the poison away and to punish the wise man that made it.

But every Middle Eastern king has his enemies and one never knows when a few jars of poison may come in handy, so Amurabi had the jars clearly labelled and had them stored in the deepest dungeon for possible later use.

Back in the harem, young Gilga had become so depressed by her failure to attract Amurabi’s attention, that she decided to end her miserable life. She crept into the deepest dungeon, drew a sharp dagger from her belt and was about to plunge it into her shapely breast, when she noticed the jars marked ‘POISON’. Rather than ruin a good robe, she decided to poison herself instead. She drank a cup of the poison, and weeping, she sat down waiting to die.

Nothing happened. So she took another cup and again waited to die, now feeling rather better and no longer weeping. After the third cup she decided that dying might not be such a good idea after all. In fact she decided to tell Amurabi just what she thought of his continued rejection.

Young Gilga marched into the royal bedchamber, grabbed the king’s companion for the night by the hair and tossed her from the room. She then proceeded to tell the king several facts about himself and herself and ended by showing him some very uninhibited tricks that both astonished him and delighted him.

The next morning, when Amurabi asked Gilga what has caused her transformation, she told him the secret of the ‘poison’ in the cellar. From that moment she became his favourite and ordered that the wonderful grape poison be served whenever he and Gilga were alone together.