Los discursos de defensa femeninos en la narrativa española del siglo XV

From ancient times, female models were constructed that classified women as “good” and “bad”, considering how well they fit on the values socially legitimated. During the fifteenth century, debates about the role of women in society —querelles des femmes— took place in Europe. There different authors took a position as “defenders” or “attackers”. However, the proposed division in those debates, through which defense discourses for women were obtained, results to be apparent and responds better to a rhetoric necessity. The creation of legitimate defense is impossible due to the ideological presuppositions from which those discourses were developed. From this hypothesis, the paper proposes the analysis of some of these “female defenses” in Spain, both those constructed with rhetoric proposes (Triunfo de las Donas) and those developed in the sentimental fiction of the fifteenth century (Grimalte y Gradissa and Grisel y Mirabella).