In medieval Spanish literature , prose began with the historiography of annals and chronicles ; later the didactic or moralizing genre appeared, and finally fiction emerged in the mid  -13th century with translations of compilations of exempla , such as Calila e Dimna and the Libro de los engaños e los asayamientos de los hombres , whose origins are in oriental Hindu, Persian and Arabic storytelling.

During the time of King Alfonso X the Wise , narrative prose evolved, benefiting from the prestige of historical chronicles, and a scientific type of wisdom prose began , which sought to compile all medieval knowledge.  The Great Conquest of Overseas dates from the end of the 13th century and the chivalric tale of Zifar was written at the beginning of the 14th century . Later, the genre of royal chronicles was born , the most notable exponent of which is the Chronicle of Alfonso XI .

Some critics consider La Celestina to be the last prose novel of the Middle Ages, although it is a transitional work to Renaissance literature and is conceived within the framework of the dramatic genre .

As López Estrada points out, the beginning of medieval prose is driven by two factors: the increasing use of the vernacular language in verse and the need, of a practical nature at first, to write local charters and documents of little importance, which later reverts to the use of vernacular prose. ^[1]​ Therefore, it is not surprising that the content of the first prose works in romance are ascribed to historiography. ^[2 ]

In the first half of the  13th century , cases of romanced stories were still exceptional since the great historical corpus was written in Latin, which was the cultured language of the time.

Among the first samples we will highlight:

• The Navarrese-Aragonese Annals , which contain the first Spanish reference to Arthurian matter. ^{[ 3} ]
• The Liber regum , written in Navarrese-Aragonese romance at the end of the 12th or beginning of the 13th century, contains a universal genealogical history - sacred and profane - plus genealogies of the Gothic and Asturian kings, of the judges, counts and kings of Castile, of the kings of Aragon, of those of France and of the Cid. ^{[ 4 ]} Its enormous diffusion allowed it to be used as a historical source in Castilian poems; by Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada for his De rebus Hispaniae ; ^{[ 5 ]} by Alfonso X for his Estoria de España and by Juan de Mena in his Laberinto de Fortuna . ^{[ 6 ]} It is considered the most important historical work of this period. ^{[ 7} ]

As can be seen, the central area of ​​the Peninsula is ahead of the rest in the use of Romance prose. ^[8] The reasons that could explain this fact are not clear. ^[9] In Castile, in the mid-12th century, we also find texts in prose and romance, such as the Fuero de Avilés and other notarial and legal documents, but most experts consider that their importance for the history of literature is infinitely less than that of the two cases cited. ^[10 ]

His most important production in the first half of the  13th century was the Romanceamientos of the Bible . ^[11] These vulgarizations ended up imposing themselves when Latin was no longer comprehensible; however, this dissemination brought with it free interpretation and a greater ease of falling into heresy. ^[12] These Romanceamientos are:

• The Exposition of Overseas . It was written during the first quarter of the  12th century . ^{[ 13 ]} The content is a geographical itinerary that follows the model of a pilgrim's guide to the Holy Land4 . It could be related to travel books, although its route is taken from other previous itineraries and not from a real trip. The book also incorporates one of the earliest translations of the Bible into a Romance language in the Peninsula , specifically historical and prophetic books of the Old Testament are translated , such as the Pentateuch , the Book of Joshua and the Book of Judges , although not from the Vulgate version but from a different Latin translation of the Hebrew text made in the  12th century , ^{[ 14 ]} along with some episodes from the New Testament , hagiographic fragments , and legends and even some material from classical antiquity .
• The Romanced Bibles . This is the name given to several codices found in the Library of El Escorial - for which reason they are also known as the Escurialense Bibles - which contain versions of the Bible in Castilian and which are one of the first examples of Spanish prose literature, as they reflect a translation that in its oldest version dates back to the  12th century . ^{[ 15 ]} We can distinguish several translations, the first, which is found in two manuscripts from the mid-  13th century with similar content (Ms. Ij-6 and Ij-8 of El Escorial), is the so-called pre-Alfonsine Bible or Romanced medieval Bible and reflects an excellent 12th century translation  of most of the books of the 4th Vulgate that also uses the biblical texts in their original languages. Error in citation: Error in citation: There is an opening code <ref> without its closing code </ref> Some of his corrections show that he took into account the pre-Alfonsine version of the Bible , which would enjoy great prestige. There are more Romanced Bibles, dating from the 14th and 15th centuries. Some of them were prepared by the Jews for their use. ^{[ 16} ]

Doctrinal literature

This genre has its origin in the numerous instructions for confessors in Latin. ^[17] The fact that this language became unintelligible to many clerics and the obligation of annual confession, established by the Fifth Lateran Council, must have forced the corresponding translations to be made. ^[18] Among these, the following stand out:

• The Ten Commandments . Its name alludes to the oldest treatise of Hispanic doctrinal literature , probably written in the early  13th century in Aragonese, in what is considered one of the first testimonies of literary writing in this language. The text contains a catechism intended for the use of confessors, as a guide on the meaning of the Decalogue that indicates the type of questions that should be asked to the penitent. ^{[ 19} ]
• Dispute between a Christian and a Jew . It is the oldest treatise of this type. It was written in Aragonese and serves as a guide to indicate to the priest the questions that he should ask the penitent. It is interesting because it reveals aspects of daily life. It takes the form of a debate, which was probably written in the first half of the  13th century . The genre in question was especially cultivated by the converts, who knew the Aristotelian argument, which collects topics that the Christians argued against the Hebrew community . ^{[ 20 ]} For this reason, since Américo Castro it has been considered that the author of this debate must have been a converted Jew. However, Nicasio Salvador does not exclude that it could be an old Christian. The text, very brief, has been transmitted to us in a fragmentary state and a fragment is preserved in which the circumcision, the observance of the Sabbath and the nature of God are discussed. Although there are many examples of the genre in both medieval and vernacular Latin literature, the Castilian text does not seem to have any relation to either of them. ^{[ 21} ]

The peculiar historical situation of the Iberian Peninsula - the coexistence of three cultures - will make the collections of sayings, widely popular in the eastern world, known very early on, and the first translations into a western language will emerge here. ^[22] It is not an easy task to specify the date when this translation work began, but there is a certain unanimity among scholars in locating them around the reigns of Ferdinand III the Saint and Alfonso X the Wise . ^[23] Given the success of these translations, a large number of texts ascribed to this genre arose that do not seem to be translations - direct, at least - of any Arabic original. At the beginning of the  14th century , wisdom literature tried a new path with the Sayings of the Holy Fathers , by Pero López de Baeza, which uses the traditional scheme to introduce Christian materials. ^[24] Its characteristics include:

• They usually have a prologue that serves as a glue for the whole.
• The origin of these sayings is usually motivated by some topic such as "meeting of wise men", "journey to the sources of wisdom" or the mention of the "lost and finally found book".
• For mnemonic reasons, these sayings usually take the form of proverbs, although sometimes they appear throughout a short dialogue or an anecdote.
• The wisdom these collections aim to convey is the voluntary acceptance of the inevitable.
• Sentences are not attributed to specific wise men.
• Very few of them are biblical.

There is, in principle, no obstacle to the same sentences circulating in a Christian, Arab or Jewish context. In the adaptations and new compilations, a greater interest in government issues is perceived, thus becoming a speculum principis . ^[25 ]

Other works belonging to this genre are:

• Flowers of Philosophy . A didactic treatise in prose, possibly from the second half of the  13th century , which is part of the genre of wisdom literature . Closely related to this book is the Book of Counsel and Counselors , which has not yet been determined whether it is a source of Flowers of Philosophy or a sequel. It was possibly composed as a mirror of princes. The Christian dimension and doctrinal purpose are also fundamental, which was achieved by adapting the morality of the original Arabic sources. It can be considered as a spiritual guide that assures man the salvation of his soul. ^{[ 26} ]
• Poridat of poridades . A didactic prose writing from the mid-  13th century that is part of the genre of wisdom literature . Its content is essentially a collection of sayings — attributed to Aristotle 's teachings to Alexander the Great — translated directly from the Arabic book of maxims Sirr al-asrar , compiled in Syria by Yuhanna ibn al-Bitriq in the  9th century . ^{[ 27 ]}​ The work is in the form of a long letter that Aristotle writes to his disciple Alexander the Great to educate him as a man and as a ruler. ^{[ 28 ] ​[ 29} ]
• Book of the Twelve Wise Men . Also called Treatise on Nobility and Loyalty (in original Old Castilian The Book of the Twelve Wise Men or Treatise on Nobility and Loyalty ) is one of the first works of didactic prose in medieval Spanish literature . The book is a treatise on the "education of princes" commissioned, apparently, on the initiative of Ferdinand III the Saint around 1237 —as we are told in the Book... — and to which a prologue was added in 1255, at the beginning of the reign of Alfonso X the Wise . ^{[ 30} ]
• Book of Good Proverbs . It was probably already in circulation in the mid  -13th century , and is part of the genre of wisdom literature . Its content is essentially a collection of sayings attributed to Greek sages translated from the  9th century Arabic book of maxims Kitab adab al-falasifa , compiled by Hunayn ibn Ishaq - Joanicius in Christian sources - from the  9th century . ^{[ 31 ]} The sayings collected in the book, and which are vaguely attributed to prestigious names, such as Aristotle , Plato or Socrates , are presented through an introductory framework - a common technique in Arabic literature - in which, on the occasion of the celebration of one of the great holidays, a wise man gives a speech to an audience, who enjoys learning these morsels of wisdom while delighting. The final part of the book is occupied by an apocryphal exchange of letters between Alexander the Great and his mother. ^{[ 32} ]

During the Middle Ages the most used and significant title of this generic group was that of exemplo or enxiemplo . ^[33] The teaching of this comes from similarity and comparison, so that the work must be read in its entirety to benefit from it and be able to apply it to real-life cases.

According to Derek William Lomax , the evolution of the exempla collections is as follows: they began as reference books written by clerics for clerics. Later, they were adapted by clerics for lay people either in the form of sermons or as pious readings. Finally, some lay people began to write this type of work for lay people — Don Juan Manuel and Count Lucanor —. These collections did not present the stories in isolation, but as a unitary whole. ^[34 ]

The characteristics of this genre are:

• Primitive organization and linear development of arguments by cause-effect relationship towards a determined end. ^{[ 35} ]
• The dialogue is scarce and secondary. ^{[ 36} ]
• They are written for a courtly environment and testify to the existence of a listening public - less often, a reading public - of noble people who are able to appreciate a higher degree than the simple folk tale . ^{[ 37} ]
• They are usually translations of oriental works. ^{[ 38} ]

Some of the outstanding works that belong to this style are:

• Disciplina clericalis . In the form of a dialogue, this work is a collection of exempla , or exemplary tales, written by Pedro Alfonso de Huesca in the early  12th century in Latin . The collection consists of a prologue and thirty-three exempla taken from written Christian, Arabic and Jewish sources and from the oral folklore of these three cultures. The work had a great impact throughout Europe and introduced oriental storytelling to the Christian West. ^{[ 39} ]
• Calila and Dimna . Contains examples of Chinese box —when a character in the inserted story tells a story that in turn contains another—, dialogue frame —a series of phrases at the beginning and end of the fable serve to differentiate the real world from the narrated one— and stringing together —a chain of stories with a single protagonist—. ^{[ 40} ]
• Sendebar . It can be categorized as a "frame novel". ^{[ 41 ]} Its full title is Book of Deceptions and the Assayings of Women . It contains a collection of Arabic tales that in turn come from the Persian or Hindu storytelling tradition . It is transmitted by the manuscript codex number Española. ^{[ 42} ]

During the reign of Ferdinand III, a fashion began that favoured the use of the vernacular language in doctrinal works, the content of which refers to teachings on human behaviour and its moral consequences, organised with an elementary criterion.

In some of these books, the didactic material is contained within a general framework. The Story of the Maiden Teodor belongs to this type of text , ^[43] which has a very long tradition in the peninsula. The origin of the book is found in one of the stories of The Thousand and One Nights and it is accepted that it could have been translated from Castilian to Arabic in the second half of the  13th century . Although in its source the Islamic doctrine is very important for the development of the story, its peculiar formal organization - questions-answers - allows its easy adaptation to new cultural contexts. Like the Sendebar , this work conceals an initiation process. ^[43 ]

Alfonsine legal production of this period is composed of three works:

• The Fuero Real . Body of laws of the Castilian king Alfonso X the Wise , drafted in 1254 and influenced by the Liber Iudiciorum , which initially became a local charter granted to the cities of Aguilar de Campoo and Sahagún in 1255. It is also called Fuero del Libro , Book of the Councils of Castile and Fuero Castellano . ^{[ 44} ]
• The Setenario . It has a miscellaneous form . In the line of a mirror of princes ( speculum principis ), the Setenario , probably designed by Ferdinand III the Saint , began as essentially a book of canon law , whose structure is adjusted to the magic number that was the number seven. It also contains encyclopedic information on the sacraments intended for priestly use and various reflections on the cult of nature from the pagan point of view. Due to this mixed character, critics have hesitated when establishing the literary genre to which it belongs. ^{[ 45} ]
• The Speculum . Its existence is documented in a mention dating from 1255. This work lays the theoretical legal foundations on which to build an argued legal corpus . It is possibly also the starting point of the remaining Alfonsine legal works. Its writing was left incomplete, and much of its material became part of his magnum opus in the field of law , the Siete Partidas . It was never promulgated and the circumstances of its composition are unclear. It is possible that it was a draft of a section of the Siete Partidas , although some critics argue that it is a work composed during the reign of Sancho IV or his son Fernando IV . ^{[ 46} ]

The concept of "scientist" is very broad in the Middle Ages and does not fit almost at all with the modern one. ^[47 ]

Alfonso X encouraged the so-called Toledo School of Translators , made up of Latin, Hebrew, and Islamic intellectuals. The king often supervised and often intervened with his own writing in the production of the vast literary work born in the translators' workshop. ^[48] [ ⁴⁹ ]

• Lapidary . A medical and magical treatise on the properties of stones in relation to astronomy written around 1250, which is preserved in the Library of El Escorial . It may have been retranslated, amended, added to and reorganized between 1276 and 1279. ^{[ 50} ]
• Book compiled in the judizios of the stars . Adaptation of the treatise of Ibn ar-Rigal (The Abenragel of the Christians) translated in 1254 by Yehuda ben Moshe . It combines, as is usual at the time, the science of astronomy with astrology. It deals with the signs of the zodiac , the planets and their qualities, the celestial movements and their influence on human life. ^{[ 51} ]
• Alfonsine tables . Astronomical tables containing the exact positions of celestial bodies in Toledo since January 1, 1252, the year of the coronation of King Alfonso, and reporting the movement of the respective celestial bodies. The influence of these tables reached Europe through a French revision of the early  14th century , whose use even reached the Renaissance . The aim of these tables was to provide a practical scheme for calculating the position of the Sun , the Moon and the planets according to the Ptolemaic system . The reference theory anticipated movements according to epicycles and their deferents. For a long time they were the basis of all the ephemerides that were published in Spain. ^{[ 52} ]

Viewed as a whole, the work of this monarch has a subtle moral character, since he conceives it as a path to the salvation of the soul: ^[53 ]

The more knowledge each person has and the more he attains it through study, the more he learns and grows and thus the more he reaches God.

General story , II, p. 31b.

At the same time, he seems to want to affirm in his readers and listeners - the members of the permanent court - an orderly worldview that would be useful for their social life and the establishment of coexistence within rules of justice that are equal for the entire kingdom. ^[54 ]

In 1256, an embassy from the city-state of Pisa offered Alfonso X the crown of the Holy Roman Empire . As this honour was elective, the Castilian king spared no effort and committed all his prestige as a learned monarch and the finances of the kingdom to obtain the imperial dignity. Only from this point of view can we understand the warlike impulse - "African crusade", conquest of El Puerto de Santa María , attack on Oran - and enlightenment that it fostered. This could be considered the beginning of prose in Castilian.

This section contains a series of works that are characterized by the fact that the texts are mainly made up of sentences - although it is not uncommon for them to include brief exempla -. ^[55] Many of these works have Arabic literature as an intermediate source and Greek as the original. ^[56] Most of these Spanish translations are closely related to each other, either because they share sources or because they influence each other. ^[57 ]

We will highlight the following treaties:

• Book of One Hundred Chapters . Collection of moral maxims organized in such a way that their recipients could not only understand them, but also use them in everyday life. ^{[ 58 ]} With this work, the Wise King intended that the nobility abandon their arrogant attitudes and adopt courtly behaviors in accordance with the possibilities that were open to them. ^{[ 59} ]
• Morsels of Gold . Its content is fundamentally a collection of sayings distributed in twenty-four chapters. Each of them collects the sayings attributed to a philosopher, except the twenty-third - whose sayings are put in the mouths of different thinkers - and the twenty-fourth - whose aphorisms are anonymous. ^{[ 60} ]

The first "disputes" had been written down throughout the previous century and in verse. Now we are witnessing a new genre in which carefully selected characters will debate crucial issues before an audience very similar to that which is the original recipient of the work. ^[61 ]

• Dialogue between Epictetus and the Emperor Hadrian . Like other works of this same genre and period, the origin of the Dialogue between Epictetus and the Emperor Hadrian is Greek. Although in this case the Castilian version comes from a Latin translation ( Adrianus et Epictetus ) and not Arabic. ^{[ 62} ]
• The Story of the Maiden Teodor . Debate on various topics of a wisdom and doctrinal nature from the second half of the  13th century . Although it presents the character of an independent story, it belonged to the collection of The Thousand and One Nights , which corroborates the fact that two Spanish Arabic manuscripts of the Story of the Maiden Teodor are preserved . ^{[ 63} ]
• Chapter from The Second Philosopher . It has been transmitted to us in two branches: the Eastern one - which amplifies the narrative framework and the number of questions - and the Western one, which takes as its basis the Latin translation carried out by Willelmus, abbot of St. Denis in the  12th century . In the first part, we are told how Second is sent to Athens where he obtains the degree of teacher and learns that there are no chaste women. Returning to his homeland incognito, he tests his mother, who does not surpass him. When she learns the truth, she dies. Second is forced to remain silent for the rest of his life and returns to Greece . In the second, the Emperor Hadrian - aware of his wisdom - sends for him. Second goes, but does not break his vow. The emperor tests the philosopher's firmness by pretending that he is going to kill him, but he persists in his muteness. Finally, admired by his perseverance, Hadrian asks him to answer his questions by writing on a tablet. The third part is this particular dialogue, a mixture of voice and writing. ^{[ 64} ]

Alfonso X came to the throne in 1252, when the kingdom's legal framework contained norms from the last days of the Roman Empire , the Visigoths , and others that were established during the Reconquista . For this reason, one of the monarch's concerns was to put this chaos in order while consolidating royal power and authority. To do this, he began a legislative reform inspired by the Digest of Justinian , a text that was the main study in the law schools of Bologna and the south of France .

This is the most ambitious work of Alfonso X in this area. Written between 1256 and 1265, it gathers the theoretical foundations of the previous legal works and formulates a legal code of universal character and general application for the kingdom of Castile that regulates the life of Castile in all areas, both religious and civil. ^[65 ]

This legal basis lasted for centuries, and its influence reaches to the present day. The Partidas were not promulgated during the lifetime of Alfonso X, since a definitive edition was never composed. It is divided into seven parts:

• First part : Addresses the foundation of law and essentially deals with canon law.
• Second : Deals with the government and legal relations between lords and vassals.
• Third : Procedural law and civil law.
• Fourth : Law of marriage, families and lineages and social states.
• Fifth : Commercial law.
• Sixth : Testamentary and inheritance law
• Seventh : Criminal law.

The sections into which it is divided do not imply strict compartments. It is also organized into titles (182) and laws (2479), the latter headed by a heading that indicates their content in a more or less approximate manner.

Its sources come from the previous Leonese law (the Fuero juzgo ), and from the aforementioned legal works of the monarch himself, the Fuero real and most likely the Espéculo . For the "First Partida" the Setenario was rewritten , a probable draft of this section.

From late Roman law, the Corpus Iuris Civilis of Justinian and the legislation for ecclesiastical life, fundamentally the Decree of Gratian and the canonical collections or Decretals , were influential .

Among its sources are ecclesiastical ones, as well as the teachings of the exempla of the Disciplina clericalis of the Jewish-convert intellectual Pedro Alfonso de Huesca . The Partidas also collect material from works of a wisdom nature or from gnomic literature, such as the Bocados de oro . ^[66 ]

From a literary point of view, legal prose is not very different from other medieval genres, and even had a powerful influence on its development, as is the case of the debate poem.

• The Book of Knowledge of Astrology . Of the three scientific compilations that Alfonso X ordered to be composed between 1276 and 1279, this is the only one that has reached us and of which the entire original text is available. It is a group of technical treatises, except for the first one, which has a descriptive content. ^{[ 67} ]
• The Book of Forms and Images . Of this treatise, which must have been written around 1277, only the prologue and the index of the eleven chapters that were to compose it have survived. ^{[ 67} ]
• The Book of Picatrix . Around 1256, Alfonso X ordered the translation into Castilian and Latin of the Ghayat al-hakim , a treatise on talismanic magic, written two hundred years earlier. Although the Castilian version is considered lost, the Latin translation ( Liber Picatrix ) spread throughout the West and achieved notable success between the 15th and 18th centuries. ^{[ 68} ]

Alfonso X undertook this task to explain his political thinking and find reasons in the past that justify both his aspirations to the imperial crown and those related to building a new political model, constantly rejected by the nobility.

Alfonsine historical production is characterised by its lack of a basic critical sense; that is, by the acceptance of the information provided by books without any verification of what was told - as Gonzalo de Berceo did - the "letter" is granted the category of truth. Another peculiarity of the genre consists in its consciously literary conception both in its elaboration and in its expository form.

Contrary to popular belief, the two productions of this genre ( Estoria de España and General estoria ) must have been created at the same time and, at times, shared materials.

The fundamental principle of organization is also identical in both: the linna or line of succession of the imperium . Within the general framework of this, the compilers usually lean towards the annalistic system, which is a serious inconvenience for the matching of complex facts . In order to resolve this difficulty, they created what they called estorias unadas : autonomous narrative units that concentrate in a historical moment all the knowledge linked to an event or a character. This narrative organization predominates in the General estoria and the departida or annalistic one in the Estoria de España .

The Estoria de España , known in Menéndez Pidal 's edition as the Primera Crónica General , is the first extensive History of Spain in Romance. Its content covers chronologically everything from the biblical and legendary origins of Spain to the immediate history of Castile under Ferdinand III .

The work had two editions. The first begins shortly after the accession to the throne of the Castilian king (c. 1260) and concludes around 1274 and the second, called ' Critical Version ' , was prepared between 1282 and 1284, the date of the death of the monarch. ^[69 ]

In its first draft, the work, completed in the early 1270s, consisted of four hundred chapters. However, in 1272, the wise king undertook another monumental project, to which he would devote new energies: the compilation of a universal history entitled General estoria , which would interrupt the writing of the Estoria de España , since, in addition to having to divert a large amount of human resources towards the new enterprise, the cumulative and ab initio concept of the historiography of the time meant that the contents of the Estoria de España overlapped to a great extent with those of the Universal History that had been started.

However, it was the Estoria de España that was disseminated, expanded, and served as a canon of Spanish historiography well into the Modern Age . The definitive version approved by Alfonso X reached chapter 616. Thus, the contradictions in the last chapters of the recasting made by Menéndez Pidal in his Primera Crónica General should not be attributed to the will of the king, but to the use for this part by the Spanish scholar of late and unsatisfactory manuscripts. ^[70 ]

To tell the story of Spain, Alfonso X goes back to the origins found in biblical sources, to Moses, to continue using myths and legends from ancient Greek and Latin history. As the story progresses, the prolixity in details increases, especially from the Germanic invasions to Fernando III , in which the most abundant sources are peninsular chronicles and epic poems .

But the most important works on which the Alfonsine text draws are the two great Latin chronicles that provided the most complete knowledge of the history of Spain at that time: the Chronicon mundi (1236), by Lucas de Tuy , bishop of Tuy , called "the Tudense", and De rebus Hispaniae (1243), by Rodrigo Ximénez de Rada , bishop of Toledo , known as "the Toledano". In addition, the Estoria de España made use of other medieval Latin chronicles, the Bible , classical Latin historiography, ecclesiastical legends, epic poems in romance and Arab historians.

The General Estoria , also called Grande e general estoria , is a very ambitious work that aims to be a universal history from the creation of the world. The work was left incomplete as it stops in the sixth part. Its writing was apparently undertaken in 1270, when the Estoria de España was already well advanced . It is possible that the beginning of this other great historiographical endeavor delayed and even prevented the completion in its definitive form of the history of Spain, due to the large number of intellectuals who had to be derived to this second great historical enterprise.

Although it has common sources and characteristics with the Estoria de España , in this case priority was given to the interest in the history books of the Bible and in the classical historians available at the royal desk, who were those who kept their validity alive in the medieval tradition, such as Ovid (from whom fragments of his Metamorphoses and the Heroides were extracted ; Lucan , from whom his Pharsalia was translated ) or the Pseudo-Callisthenes that provided news of the life of Alexander the Great . Materials from the Renaissance of the 12th century were also used , especially French works: the Roman de Thèbes , the Roman de Troie (for the Theban and Trojan subjects ), the Alexandreis by Gautier de Châtillon (for the Macedonian emperor ) or the Historia regum britanniae , by the Welshman Geoffrey of Monmouth , for the Arthurian subject .

The purpose of the work appears in the following text:

[to chronicle] all the great deeds that have happened throughout the world to the Goths, to the Gentiles, to the Romans, to the Barbarians, to the Jews, to Maphomat, to the Moors because of the deceitful faith that he raised, and all the kings of Spain, from the time that Joachim married Anna and when Hoctaviano Caesar began to reign until the time that I began to reign, I, Don Alfonso, by the grace of God, King of Castile.

Just as in the Estoria de España , the aim was to link his monarchy with history from the beginning of time up to his reign, since Alfonso X the Wise aspired to the title of emperor. It was a political enterprise that sought to place Castile at the head of the Christian kingdoms of the peninsula and to do so the monarch provided himself with an adequate historical justification.

• The Trojan History is polymetric . It has arrived headless and truncated at the end, and takes the form of a prosimetrum ^{[ 71 ]}​ because the counterpoint between the exterior (battles, speeches, narrative digressions) and the subjectivity of the characters favors the alternation of verse and prose. If the narrative text is quite faithful to the Gallic original, the verses - on the other hand - are mostly original since they do not translate, but paraphrase in an amplified form. ^{[ 72} ]
• The Romances of the Matter of Antiquity or History of Alexandre . With this epigraph we intend to record two events that occurred in Castile in the mid-  fourteenth century , the gradual resurgence of interest in classical antiquity and the effort to reinvent some arguments to fit into them concerns of their present or patterns of their moral thought - let us keep in mind that for medieval man history is a seamless continuum that begins with creation and reaches his days. Only from this conception, for example, is it possible to understand that Alfonso X felt himself to be the direct heir of the Roman emperors. ^{[ 73} ]

Among these works of sport or recreation of nobles, there is a treatise on falconry by Muhammad ibn Allah al-Bayzar (called by Christians Moamin , an Arab falconer of the  9th century ), the Book of the Animals that Hunt , and a book on board games that describes and teaches chess (although it had rules somewhat different from the modern one), dice and tables. Features of these last two games have also survived to this day in backgammon and alquerque ^[74] respectively.

Also called the Book of Chess, Dice and Tables , it is the oldest preserved chess treatise in Europe and consists of 98 pages illustrated with numerous miniatures showing the positions of the games.

It is one of the most important documents for the research of board games. The only known original is in the library of the Monastery of El Escorial . A copy from 1334 is preserved in the library of the Royal Academy of History .

It documents the state and rules of medieval chess at the time when it was introduced into the Christian kingdoms from Islam .  13th century chess is different from modern chess, which arose from the revolution that chess brought about in the  15th century and is reflected by Luis Ramírez de Lucena in his Renaissance treatise Repetition of Loves and the Art of Chess ( Salamanca , 1497). Basically it was a slower game, with fewer chances of winning by checkmate and whose didactic treatises (such as that of the wise king) gave great importance to the resolution of imaginative chess problems .

The accession of Sancho IV the Brave to the throne was motivated, in part, by the rejection of a sector of Castilian high society to the policy of Alfonso X and his admiration for Arab and Jewish culture. ^[75] For this reason, the king will react against these tendencies, supported by his wife, María de Molina . This orthodox attitude, in accordance with Christianity and conservative morality, is known as "Molinism", whose basic principles are: putting God before all things, striving to complete good works and being guided by reason - "natural sense" -. ^[76 ]

The court becomes the seat of a new cultural model. This does not mean that the literary framework that the Wise King had fostered disappears, but that it adjusts to the new ideological framework with which the new monarchs want to identify themselves. Now, the cultivation of reason will triumph - over the search for knowledge - and the defense of Christianity will take place not only on the battlefield , but in texts - Barlaam and Josafat or the Great Conquest of Overseas , for example. ^[77 ]

Ramón Menéndez Pidal described the intellectual activity during this reign as "very poor and controversial." ^[78] However, in light of new research, this statement must be reconsidered. Thus, Professor Orduna proposes the existence of an intellectual group that emerged around the cathedral school of Toledo, with a well-defined cultural and political project and whose action and encouragement determined the appearance of an important set of texts, which until now have been seen as isolated or unconnected milestones. He even thinks that the production of Don Juan Manuel - friend of the archdeacon Ferrán Martínez, possible author of the Libro del cavallero Zifar - ^[79] and the Libro de buen amor ^[80] could be determined by the cultural program developed by the cathedral school of Toledo. Therefore, several works would be attributable to the court of King Sancho IV, classified as:

In this category, the Libro del tesoro stands out , a translation of Li Livres dou Tresor , an encyclopedia compiled in France by Brunetto Latini between 1260 and 1267 and later expanded in Florence (c. 1275). Only the first version reaches Spain , of which thirteen manuscripts are preserved. The curious thing is that in some, Alfonso X is cited as the promoter of the translation and in others, Sancho IV . Therefore, it is possible that two translations of the same work were made. ^[81 ]

Continuing with the work begun decades earlier, the intellectuals of the time of Sancho IV undertook the execution of several works with doctrinal themes, such as:

• Lucidario . It is an encyclopedic miscellany from the end of the  13th century that was "ordered" -literally- to be compiled in Castilian by Sancho IV of Castile from Latin sources. The work is composed of 106 chapters that deal with curious and varied subjects on all kinds of knowledge, both theological and natural history , in the manner that was frequent in medieval literature . It adopts the oriental structure of a teacher's answers to his disciple's questions. ^{[ 82} ]
• Punishments of Sancho IV . Incorrectly known as Punishments and documents of King Don Sancho IV , it is a prose work in Castilian from the late  13th century . It belongs to the genre of specula principis (mirrors of princes), treatises that had the objective of designing the lines of behavior of the princes to model them as ideal rulers, simultaneously establishing the bases of what a Christian state should be. It is, therefore, an example of didactic and moralizing literature, typical of the  13th century . ^{[ 83} ]
• Book of Council and Counsellors . Attributed to a certain master Pedro, it is a manual about the relations that the king should maintain with his counsellors in which topics discussed in the Secret of Secrets and the Second Partida are taken up again . It is inspired by the Liber consolationis et consilii of Albertano de Brescia. ^{[ 84} ]

Contrary to what one might think, Sancho IV continued writing the Estoria de España , but as a means of justifying the acts that had brought him to the throne and of instilling in the aristocracy a model of chivalrous conduct that would link it to the crown. ^[85] This is known as the Amplified Version of 1289 , whose greatest importance lies in the fact that it would profoundly modify the historiographic genre, as it lays the foundations for moving from a "general chronicle" - that is, a text that seeks to record all the events that occurred in Spain - to a real chronicle - that is, one that adjusts its account to the events of a specific reign. ^[86 ]

• Barlaam and Josafat . It contains a version of the story of Buddha greatly transformed and which serves as a framework for a set of exempla related to collections of oriental origin, such as the Calila e Dimna or the Sendebar . It has been transmitted to us in several manuscripts of the  15th century that present earlier linguistic features that could date from the  13th century or the first quarter of the 14th century, since the story told was taken as a basis from the Book of States (c. 1326 ^{[ 87 ]} ​) of the Infante Don Juan Manuel . ^{[ 55 ] ​[ 88} ]

• Great Conquest of Overseas . It includes avery novelistic chronicle of the conquest of Jerusalem during the First Crusade and dates from between 1291 and 1295 in its first draft. The text includes independent narratives of great interest from theFrench epic , such as the story of The Knight of the Swan , Bertha of the Big Feet or the Mainete . ^{[ 89 ]}​ The oldest and also the most extensive manuscript in which it has been transmitted to us (360 pages) is preserved in the National Library of Madrid and was composed in 1295. ^{[ 90} ]

With the death of Sancho IV, his wife, Doña María de Molina, is relegated to a secondary role at court. ^[91] However, her role will be fundamental - first as queen mother and then as queen grandmother - in trying to maintain a social and political order that will draw the new models of fiction. ^[92 ]

For the successors of Alfonso X, history is no longer so much an interpretation of the past to support the present, but rather a framework in which to justify their political behavior. ^[93] It is therefore not surprising that in the  14th century the royal chronicles acquired special value and that in the 15th century the so-called private chronicles appeared . ^[94 ]

• Derivations of the Estoria de España . The chroniclers of this century preferred to use the workbooks to which, after the pause of 1275, materials had continued to be added. Thus, two very different projects arose, but animated by similar purposes: the Chronicle of Twenty Kings and the Chronicle of Castile . ^{[ 95} ]
• Royal chronicles . Its main objective was to recount the actions undertaken by the monarchs of the time, especially those of the Crown of Castile . The birth of this new genre also meant the appearance of a new type of writer: the royal chronicler; that is, the person appointed by the monarch to give an account of his deeds . ^{[ 96} ]

Since the monarch came of age in 1325, there will be three keys to his political thought: chivalry as his model of court; the recovery of the historiographical plot to understand the present and justify it and the restoration of a legal order that makes it the center of a theory and a legislative practice. ^[97 ]

This restoration takes shape in three orders: that of Burgos (1338), that of Villa Real (1346) and that of Alcalá (1348). The latter is undoubtedly the outstanding text in this field, a direct heir to the Siete Partidas of Alfonso the Wise. ^[98 ]

Under this heading are collected the numerous hunting treatises, among which we will highlight the Book of Falconry and Treatise on Falconry , relating to hunting topics , which were so popular with the members of King Sancho's court. ^[99 ]

It should be noted that, following Professor Gómez Redondo, we will use the term romance in this context to refer to works of prose fiction. ^[100 ]

• The romances of hagiographical material experienced great development in the final years of the  13th century and in the first decades of the 14th century, due undoubtedly to the influence of Doña María de Molina. Two of this group stand out: the Estoria de Santa María Egiçiaca and El Cavallero Pláçidas . ^{[ 101} ]
• Book of the Knight Zifar . It is the first extensive fictional adventure story in Spanish prose ^{[ 102 ]} and was composed around 1300. It presents features of the chivalric novel and was probably written by a certain Ferrand Martínez , a cleric from Toledo , who appears in a story in the prologue.
• Romances of chivalric subject matter . These works were considered universal mirrors of princes and lords, so their expansion was European and formed an intricate network of works, although with common features and intentions. ^{[ 103} ]
• Romances of Carolingian subject matter . In the  14th century , still under the influence of Molinist thought, what mattered about the figure of Charlemagne was the position he played in the political-moral framework of his court. Four stories were woven around the emperor: Flores y Blancaflor , Mainete , Cuento del emperador Carlos Maynes and Enrique, fi de Oliva . ^{[ 104} ]
• Romances of historiographical material. The Materia de Troya stands out , which not only alludes to the war events related to the Trojan War , but also to the history, politics, culture, customs and, in a special way, the mythology of Greece . Because, in fact, the Trojan matter constitutes a "matter of Greece". ^{[ 105} ]

The religious renewal movement promoted by María de Molina not only took shape in literary works such as the Zifar , but in specific treatises that, throughout the first half of the  14th century , began to be written in Castilian. ^[106] Good examples of this are the debate entitled Vision of Filiberto , ^[107] the Sayings of the Holy Fathers by Pero López de Baeza ^[108] and the Treatise on the Assumption of the Virgin Mary by the Infante Don Juan Manuel . ^[109 ]

• The Castilian Gloss to the Regiment of Princes . Around 1344, Bernabé (bishop of Osma ), ordered to transfer the work of Egidio Romano , De regimine principum , to Fray Juan García de Castrojeriz, of the Order of the Friars Minor , confessor of Queen Maria of Portugal and tutor of Prince Pedro . ^{[ 110} ]
• Notice of the royal dignity . The most likely context to place it is the second quarter of the  14th century , when Alfonso XI had already assumed the age of majority. (The Notice is composed of a prologue and twenty-seven chapters. The prologue deals with the dignity of the court. ^{[ 111} ]
• Treatise on the Community , an abbreviated version of the Communiloquium —a manual for preachers in which they were provided with a varied repertoire of examples with which to indoctrinate the faithful according to their social category, age, sex or personal circumstances— by John of Wales . It is composed of two parts: on the regiment of the community and government and on the regiment of the individual.

Although he built his work throughout the  14th century , his cultural conception inherited the literary models of Alfonso IV, but filtered by the moral and religious values ​​of the court of Sancho IV. Not in vain, the literary beginnings of Don Juan Manuel - between 1320 and 1325 - follow the path established by his uncle Alfonso X for literary prose: history ( Crónica abreviada ), legal provisions for chivalry, its status ( Libro del cavallero et del escudero ) and entertainment. ^[112 ]

The study and learning of history is a basic pillar in the educational system set forth in the Book of States :

And then, they must do everything they can so that they take pleasure in reading the chronicles of the great deeds and the great conquests and the feats of arms and chivalry that occurred [...]

Book of States , I, LXVII.

According to the General Prologue , he had written two works on this subject: «[...] and the other, of the abbreviated chronicle ; and the other, the complete chronicle [...]». Of which only the first has reached us. ^[113 ]

This section includes two texts:

• Book of the Knight and the Squire . This book is composed of a prologue and fifty-one chapters, of which the end of the third to the beginning of the sixteenth have been lost. The prologue is important because it indicates how the work was composed. ^{[ 114} ]
• Book of States . It was written between 1327 and 1332. As regards its structure, it is difficult to determine due to the heterogeneity of the compositional materials and the clumsy capitulation, perhaps the work of some copyist.

Here are collected the works entitled as:

• Infinite Book . It is a sort of aristocratic regiment of Don Juan Manuel for his son and is presented as a synthesis of the Book of States , to which he often refers for the explanation of topics that are only outlined here. ^{[ 115} ]
• Book of the Three Reasons . In this work, Don Juan Manuel intends to demonstrate the superiority of his lineage. ^{[ 115 ]}​ And the verb "to demonstrate" is the most precise, since the key to the work is found in the term "reason", which for Don Juan Manuel means "reasoning", "argument", "proof"; but also - according to the Thomist tradition - concrete literary organization with which the confirmation of some fact or thought is achieved. ^{[ 115} ]
• Treatise on the Assumption of the Virgin Mary . It is considered to be Don Juan Manuel's last work because it is not mentioned in his General Prologue - written in 1342 - and because it presents features of his last stage: the prince is the author, narrator and character, he accumulates evidence in order to demonstrate a previous argument. ^{[ 115} ]
• Book of Count Lucanor . It is the best known work of Don Juan Manuel. For the most part it is a book of exempla or moralizing stories written between 1330 and 1335 by the Infante Don Juan Manuel . It is considered the crowning work of prose narrative of the 14th century in Spanish literature. ^{[ 115} ]

If a literary genre is affected by political events, it is historiography. That is why nothing has been preserved from that promoted by Peter I of Castile during his reign. ^[116 ]

For the successors of Alfonso X, history is no longer so much an interpretation of the past to support the present, but rather a framework in which to justify their political behavior. Therefore, it is not surprising that in the  14th century the royal chronicles and with them the figure of the chancellor Pero López de Ayala acquired special value . ^[117 ]

This classification includes pilgrimage guides, merchants' tours, geographical encyclopedias, wonderful stories and private adventures. The works share traits such as the itinerarium , which constitutes the warp or framework of the story; the enumeration of places and customs is done chronologically, where great importance is given to space; especially to cities; the identity between author and narrator brings with it the use of the first person and the imitation of the same resources. ^[118 ]

The most notable texts of this genre are:

• Book of Knowledge .Anonymous Castilian  geographic and armorial manual from the end of the 14th century ( after 1385) which, under the appearance of an autobiographical journey, contains an itinerary with information about the then known world, its rulers and their coats of arms. ^{[ 119} ]
• The Book of the Marvels of the World . Together with Marco Polo's Book of Marvels , from whose title and various novelization strategies it borrows, it is undoubtedly the most widely circulated text of this genre in medieval Europe. Mandeville's Journey combines the pilgrimage form with the addition of two kinds of fabulous material: that of devotional legends and a good deal of monsters from the Plinian tradition . ^{[ 119} ]
• Vision of Don Túngano . Allegorical journey written around 1140 by an Irish monk, it became one of the paradigmatic works of apocalyptic visions. The peninsular testimonies of this book are quite numerous, since translations into Portuguese, Catalan and Aragonese are preserved. ^{[ 119} ]
• Purgatory of Saint Patrick . Like the previous composition, it is an allegorical journey. It is a widely disseminated story, as Latin versions of the narrative appear in a large number of manuscripts. Thus, it is collected in Roger de Wendover 's Flores Historiarum , in the Golden Legend , and in Vincent de Beauvais' Speculum historiale . ^{[ 120} ]

• The Legenda aurea ( Golden Legend ) is a collection of saints ' lives written in Latin by Santiago de la Vorágine around 1264. Its diffusion was extraordinary and it became the reference work of the hagiographic genre. Although no complete translation has been preserved in Spanish, it seems that there were two large textual cores, called by specialists as "Compilation A" - formed in the first half of the  14th century - and "Compilation B", which showed more freedom with respect to the original text and, consequently, could admit the incorporation and exclusion of vitae or develop them with another narrative treatment. ^{[ 120} ]
• The Legend of Saint Amaro . Two medieval testimonies survive of this story, which is not included in the great hagiographic compilations: one Portuguese and one Castilian, between which there are no textual relations. ^{[ 120} ]
• The Life of Saint Alexius . Hagiographic poem of 625 verses composed at the beginning of the  11th century . In it, Alexis, son of a Roman count, accepts the marriage imposed on him by his father. However, he runs away on the very day of the wedding to dedicate himself to religion. He reaches Syria where, after giving away all his money among the poor, he becomes a mendicant for seventeen years, after which he returns to Rome where he remains another seventeen years incognito, in his father's house, hidden under a staircase. When he dies, his body is found next to a parchment in which he tells his life. ^{[ 120} ]
• The Life of Saint Pelagia . It is related to the mester de clerecía text and similar to the Estoria de Santa Maria Egiçiaca , which narrates the life of Pelagia of Antioch , a Christian ascetic of the 5th century  . ^{[ 121} ]

In the second half of the century, short stories underwent a curious evolution: there is hardly a literary genre that does not include exempla in many of its manifestations, but no specific collections were produced. With the exception of the Book of Cats and the Enxemplos that belong to the Viridario .

The reign of Henry III the Sick , nicknamed thus for his ailments, was not easy. In addition to the economic crisis, he had to face the religious problem on two fronts: anti-Semitism and the Western Schism . He also faced political difficulties, motivated by the ambition of the nobility. ^[122 ]

As we have already seen, the advent of the Trastámaras led to the development of royal chronicles as a way of explaining the present and providing it with its own ideological framework. ^[123] The logical consequence of this reduction of the historiographical point of view will be the appearance of private chronicles : biographies of people who will want to leave their mark on time in order to justify certain actions. ^[123 ]

The 15th century is therefore  not the best time for general chronicles. Although there are some noteworthy ones:

• Chronicle of 1404. It is the most original. Its most significant contribution is the attention it pays to chivalric material, especially to Arthurian episodes . ^{[ 123} ]
• Tale of the Kings . It is a brief summary focused on the reign of Pedro I and the first years of his half-brother. It is inserted in El Victorial by Díaz de Games, who attributes it to Pero Niño's grandfather. ^{[ 123} ]
• The Summary of the Pantry of Queen Leonor is the best example of the genre. The author creates a new historiographical structure in which he mixes elements of the royal chronicles (the biographies of the monarchs as temporal supports) with others from general chronicles. ^{[ 123} ]

The Embassy to Tamerlane is the best-known travel book of the period. Written in 1406 ^[124] by Ruy González de Clavijo , its content is a complete and detailed account of the embassy that this author carried out, together with the Dominican Alfonso Páez de Santamaría to Samarkand before King Tamerlane by diplomatic decision of King Henry III of Castile . ^[125 ]

The literature that emerged during the reign of John II is, in large part, a consequence of the clashes for power between three circles of power. The first was known as "Aragonese", supporters of Ferdinand of Antequera - king of Aragon and uncle of John II - and his descendants. The other two parties were those of the nobles and the one formed around the figure of the favorite Álvaro de Luna . The different conceptions of the Castilian monarchy that each of the groups had caused several struggles in the first half of the 15th century  . ^[126 ]

• The Chronicle of John II . It covers three periods of its development. It was written by Álvar García de Santa María. The first part (1406-1419) covers the first half of the reign, focusing on the figure of the regent Fernando de Antequera . The late King Henry III the Grieving is presented as a model of virtue. In the second part, Álvaro de Luna , the royal favourite, stands out as the protagonist . A remake, attributed to Pérez de Guzmán, tells the life and work of Álvaro de Luna, taking special interest in his rise and fall. ^{[ 127} ]
• The Chronicle of the Falconer . Its writing is divided into two important phases. In the first (1420-1441), the author, Pero Carrillo de Huete, managed to create a magnificent diplomatic chronicle by consulting any document that arrived at the Chancellery. The author of the second part (1441-1450) is Lope de Barrientos , who gives more importance to the political panorama and the events that occurred during the reign of John II. ^{[ 128} ]
• The so-called Refundición del Halconero . Traditionally attributed to Lope de Barrientos , the authorship is disputed, as is the debate that it is a continuation of the Crónica del Halconero . Gómez Redondo points out that "it is a chronicle writing totally independent of any of the historiographical lines dedicated to Juan II, attributable, (...) with the possible cautions, to Fernán Pérez de Guzmán (...)". ^{[ 128} ]
• The Private Chronicles . The advent of the House of Trastámara led to the development of the royal chronicles as a way of explaining the present and providing it with its own ideological framework. The logical consequence of this reduction of the historiographical point of view will be the appearance of the private chronicles: biographies of people who will want to leave their mark on time in order to justify certain actions. Before the  15th century only Don Juan Manuel had turned his life into literary material. It will now be the nobility - both old and new - that will configure a historical order. ^{[ 129} ]

There has been much discussion about the possible pre-humanism of Spain. However, this is not possible for various reasons, such as the ignorance of classical languages ​​by those who could have been involved in it, except for Villena. Factors such as the lack of an audience to receive the productions also contributed to this. In addition, humanistic concepts entered the Peninsula through Aragon and the Castilian court was increasingly distant from it.

Literary circles and book production workshops will be created, which will depend entirely on the curiosity and diligence of those who promote them.

• Enrique de Villena . His work covered numerous subjects, since during his life he cultivated a variety of sciences from medicine, theology, astronomy and even poetry. But where he stood out the most was in the translation of texts into various languages. Some of his works were destroyed, while others doubt their authenticity. He was a controversial character in his time and even afterwards. The fame he achieved, more as a magician than as a writer, inspired Ruiz de Alarcón , Rojas Zorrilla , Quevedo and Hartzenbusch , who made him a character in some of their works.
• Íñigo López de Mendoza , better known as the Marquis of Santillana , was one of the first historians of Spanish literature and was interested in questions of poetics , as shown by the prologue he wrote to his works, the Proemio e carta al condestable don Pedro de Portugal . All of his work can be classified within the allegorical-Dantesque school ; he was without a doubt the most fervent admirer of Dante Alighieri in Spain , and he also assimilated what he could of the humanism of Petrarch and Giovanni Boccaccio .

There have been few kings as inept in the exercise of politics and as attentive to the promotion and translation of works as John II. ^[130] This is how Fernán Pérez de Guzmán describes him in his Generations and Profiles :

He liked to hear wise and graceful men and he greatly noted what he heard from them; he knew how to speak and understand Latin, he read very well, he liked many books and stories, he listened very willingly to rhymed sayings and knew their vices, he had great pleasure in hearing cheerful and well-pointed words, and he even knew how to say them well. He used to hunt a lot and go hunting in the mountains and understood well all the art of it. He knew the art of music, he sang and played well, and even in jousting and reed games he was good. But although he had a reasonable share of all these graces, of those that are truly virtues and that are necessary to every man, and principally to kings, he was very defective.

Fernán Pérez de Guzmán, Generations and Profiles .

Although we must not forget that he had a chancellery governed by the Santa María family and a council made up of doctors and educated religious men, to whom he entrusted treatises on very different disciplines.

• Pablo García de Santa María . His vernacular production is linked to his positions —Mayor Chancellor and educator of Juan II—, from which his interest in historiography must come. His best-known work is The Seven Ages of the World , a compendium of universal and national history in 339 major stanzas and written around 1418 - 1426. Around 1460 a recasting was carried out that is accompanied by a lengthy prose gloss. This recasting extends the original historiographical account and adds a large number of touch-ups and corrections to the text that, in general, do not affect its content.
• Álvar García de Santa María, brother of the previous one, was in charge of continuing the registration of the royal chronicle , interrupted by the death of Pero López de Ayala . He carried out this task until 1434, the year in which —affirms Pérez de Guzmán in the prologue to his Generations and Semblances— «the story was taken over and passed to other hands and, according to the disordered ambitions that exist at this time, it is reasonable to fear that the chronicle is not in that purity and simplicity that the order had (...)».
• Alfonso de Cartagena . Apart from his translations of twelve books by Seneca, in which he was particularly interested, and the already cited works of Cicero, he wrote a Rerum in Hispania gestarum Chronicon (c. 1456), which is a history of Spain following Flavius ​​Josephus , Florus and Jiménez de Rada entitled Anacephaleosis .
• Alonso Fernández de Madrigal . Known as Tostado , his enormous Latin work—he made the expression "writing more than Tostado" proverbial—occupied fifteen large volumes in the Venetian edition published between 1507 and 1530. The bulk of it consists of extensive Latin commentaries on various books of the Bible.
• Archpriest of Talavera . His real name was Alfonso Martínez de Toledo. He wrote two hagiographies : a Life of Saint Isidore and a Life of Saint Ildefonso , as well as a historical compilation covering the years from the Gothic kings to Henry III ( Atalaya de las crónicas , 1443) and El Corbacho or Reprobación del amor mundano (1438), whose title comes from Giovanni Boccaccio 's Corbaccio , although it is not inspired by it. It is an invective against worldly love and lust divided into four parts which aim to explain in detail the pernicious effects of earthly love on the spirit and body of man.
• Diego de Valera . He wrote Epistles full of advice to the kings, in a traditional style. A history of the world up to his time based on previous chronicles, entitled Abridged Chronicle or Valeriana (1482), in which the part dedicated to John II stands out, as a direct connoisseur of the events. A chronicle of Henry IV is the Memorial of various exploits , whose continuation by the same pen is the Chronicle of the Catholic Monarchs , which covers the years 1474 and 1488 and deals with the war against Portugal and the war of Granada. Among its sources can be recognized, for the first, the Decades of Palencia , and, for the second, the Letters of the Marquis of Cadiz.

Without reaching the development of the Alfonsine court, between 1430 and 1450 this type of texts was promoted again by royal initiative. Surely, the most outstanding fruit of this impulse is the Visión deleytable by the bachelor Alfonso de la Torre. ^[131 ]

Although this genre was to be separated from courtly literature and fiction, this did not mean its decline, as it acquired a basically religious orientation, which led to the formation of collections and their survival. The main compilations of this period are:

• Book of exemplos by abc . Work of Clemente Sánchez de Vercial, made for Juan Alfonso de la Borbolla, canon of Sigüenza . one of the best known compilations of exempla of medieval Spanish literature . It has the particularity of being the only compilation of examples in alphabetical order. The quantity and size of fonts that they possess add even more importance to the text. ^{[ 132} ]
• The Speculum of the Laymen . Translation into Spanish of the work Speculum Laicorum , written in Latin at the end of the  13th century . The translation was made in the first half of the  15th century . In principle it had been organized in alphabetical order, although in the translation into Spanish this custom is lost. Its purpose has not been clarified either, since some authors consider that it was to serve as an instrument for preachers, but others debate arguing that it was only a work of reading. The main sources of this text are the Bible and the texts of the Apostolic Fathers . ^{[ 132} ]
• The Very Notable Examples . Compilation of sermons by French Dominicans , such as Vincent of Beauvais, Étienne de Bourbon and Umberto de los Romanos. It has coincidences with many works by Dominicans, even later ones, such as those of Arnold of Liège ( Alphabetum Narrationum ) and Juan Gobio. ^{[ 132} ]
• The Memorable Acts and Sayings of Valerius Maximus. Its original title is Factorum et dictorum memorabilium . It is the oldest compilation of exemplum that have come down to us today. It is a translation of the work of Publius Valerius Maximus, which is the main repertoire of exempla that Antiquity bequeaths to the Middle Ages. It is a collection of short, curious or moral stories, without scientific value. ^{[ 132} ]

Fiction needs, above all, an audience that sees itself reflected in it. Therefore, the transformation of this audience or the raising of new problems causes a work to transform itself - this occurred, for example, with the Book of the Knight Zifar , in which the conception of the third part is very different from the first - or the narrative discourses to change. ^[133 ]

Until now, love has played an important role in medieval texts, but it has not been predominant. In this century, the audience of romances demands that greater attention be paid to it. But before this happens, the "sentimental reality" must be created. If one had to put dates to the "invention", they would be the years 1428 to 1441, since in those years the Cancionero de Baena was compiled , whose prologue defines the courtier as a poet and lover, a treatise was written that reflects on love and the importance that should be given to women in this framework and texts related to the subject were translated and glossed. ^[134 ]

Before love entered fiction, there was a whole network of theoretical reflections, which arose in university cloisters and were later transferred to the court. One of the first channels in the formation of sentimental ideology is the Breviloquio de amor y de amiçiçia by Tostado. Significant works in this genre are:

• Treatise on how man must love . Letter from Alfonso Fernández de Madrigal to a companion, where he explains his infatuation to a correspondent who reprimanded him for having fallen in love. In the work there are certain features of autobiography, epistle and love theme. The work opens with an exordium that attempts to elucidate to the reader the purpose for which the text was written. ^{[ 134} ]
• Treatise on love , attributed to Juan de Mena . ^{[ 134} ]

Along with the treatises seen above, a series of texts are creating a new audience that will be the perfect recipient of sentimental fiction.

First of all, there is the Cancionero de Baena , whose prologue already outlines a new courtier. He, in addition to reading "stories" and enjoying his usual leisure activities, must learn and practice a new art: "poetry and gay science," reserved for someone "who is of very high and subtle influences, and of very elevated and pure discretion, and of very sound and right judgment, and such that he has seen and heard and read many and varied books and writings and knows all languages, and even that he has attended courts of kings and with great lords, and that he has seen and talked about many events in the world, and, finally, that he is a noble, nobleman and courteous and measured and gentle and graceful and polished and charming and that he has honey and sugar and salt and air and charm in his reasoning, and others that he is a lover, and that he always prides himself and pretends to be in love; Because it is the opinion of many wise men that every man who is in love should love whom he should and how he should and where he should, they affirm and say that such a man is learned in all good doctrines. ^[135 ]

It was also important that the fables of Antiquity were seen as something useful and to do so, interpreting them in an allegorical way is essential. Although the technique is not new - it was already used by Alfonso X - around the same time, Enrique de Villena wrote The Twelve Labors of Hercules , Boccaccio 's Genealogia deorum gentilium was translated at the express request of some courtier or Tostado wrote The Ten Vulgar Questions . ^[134 ]

The sentimental novel will make women its central element. Before this happens, a series of texts will examine the different facets of the female condition. The most important are:

• Book of the clear and virtuous women . It is a laudatory text dating from the first half of the  15th century . It was written by the favourite of King Juan II, Álvaro de Luna, with the collaboration of some authors such as Juan de Mena. It is said to have been written at the request of many women who wanted to thank the work. For the first time, although it is a work of fiction, the female audience has the power of "enough action to commission the writing of a prologue in which their point of view is inserted (...)". ^{[ 136} ]
• The Treatise in Defense of Virtuous Women by Diego de Valera .
• The work of Juan Rodriguez del Padron .

Just as he promoted the writing of treatises on women - he was the author of one of the most important works of the genre: Book of the Clear and Virtuous Women -, Álvaro de Luna also promoted the development of chivalric ideology. These new orientations reached historiography, which now became interested in the narrative models of fiction; that is, it was no longer a matter of chronicles collecting information from literary genres, but rather adopting the techniques of the romance . The most important example of all this is the Saracen Chronicle by Pedro de Corral. ^[137 ]

The reign of Henry IV the Impotent was not easy either. To the problems that his father already had with the nobility and because of the favourites, we must add the succession issue: given the doubts about the paternity of his daughter Juana la Beltraneja - attributed to the royal favourite Beltrán de la Cueva -, he was forced to name as successor his half-brother Alfonso de Trastámara , who was proclaimed king ( Alfonso XII ) in the Farce of Ávila . ^[138] But the infant died in 1468, but his death did not resolve the issue since the supporters of the infant will now support Isabel , sister of Alfonso, who will be recognized as heir by the Treaty of the Bulls of Guisando . However, her conception of the monarchy causes her allies to abandon her and go on to defend the candidacy of her niece Juana. Finally, the treaties of Alcaçovas (1479) will leave Isabel as the only pretender to the throne and queen of Castile , due to the death of her brother in 1474. ^[139 ]

The literature of the period was characterised by the rise of chronicles and allegorical travel stories. A new genre was now included in Spanish literature: the political treatise. Sentimental fiction and religious and hagiographic works did not flourish as they once did, but books in these genres continued to be written.

• Rodrigo Sánchez de Arévalo wrote a copious Latin work, particularly on canon law and politics. The De arte, disciplina et modo aliendi et erudiendi filios, pueros et juvenes or "Treaty on the technique, method and manner of raising children, boys and young people" (1453) is the first manual of pedagogy to be produced in Spain at the dawn of the Renaissance ; Antonio de Nebrija made extensive use of it when he composed his treatise on education; however, unlike his Latin humanistic models, it does not reserve any role for literary training and does not confer on it any pedagogical value, which must be attributed to a voluntary distancing from the previous period, the reign of John II, characterized by his love of letters. In De remediis aflictae Ecclesiae he proposes to strengthen the authority of the Pope in the face of the conciliarist movement and to indicate remedies for the ills suffered by the church... and among these, the reading of pagan books figures prominently. Sacred literature must therefore take precedence over pagan literature.
• Alfonso of Palencia . Alfonso of Palencia's main work is the monumental Gesta Hispaniensia ex annalibus suorum diebus colligentis , usually called Decades because it is divided into decades in the style of Titus Livius . This chronicle covers the events from the end of the reign of John II until 1481, including the reign of Henry IV, his confrontation with the supporters of his half-brother Alfonso, the conflict over the succession of Henry IV , the subsequent civil war and the consolidation of the Catholic Monarchs on the throne after the signing of the peace . ^{[ 140} ]

• Teresa de Cartagena . The writing of her books Arboleda de los Enfermedades and Admiraçión Operum Dey is largely due to the deafness that affected the author from 1453 or 1459. She is considered the first mystical writer in Spanish and the last of her books is considered by some authors to be the first feminist text written by a Spanish woman.
• Diego Rodríguez de Almela . He wrote the Compilation of the Miracles of Santiago , discovered and edited in modern times by Torres Fontes and, urged by the archdeacon of Valpuesta Juan Manrique, a Valerius of the Scholastic Histories of Spain (1462), an imitation of Valerius Maximus in nine books that offers moral epigraphs with biblical or national historical examples; it was printed in Murcia in 1487 and was for a long time much reprinted and wrongly attributed to Fernán Pérez de Guzmán . He also wrote a Treatise called Compilation of Pitched Battles .

The masterpiece of this genre in the reign of Henry IV is the Triste delementation . The author of this work, which for the first time breaks away from the traditional canons until then, is unknown. Deyermond points out that it is influenced by Italian chivalric novels and songbooks. It features two pairs of lovers, in which the women try to take revenge on the men for repressing their desires. In short, it is a masterpiece of sentimental fiction. ^[141 ]

Travels abroad were not rare under the Trastámaras. Remember, for example, the Embassy to Tamorlane by Ruy González de Clavijo, to Alfonso de Cartagena , Spanish delegate at the Council of Basel between 1434 and 1439, or to Diego de Valera , who completed his chivalric training at different European courts. A new travel chronicler appears under Henry IV: Pero Tafur . ^[141 ]

The reign of the Catholic Monarchs, Isabel I and Ferdinand V of Castile ( Ferdinand II of Aragon ) marked the transition from the medieval world to the modern world in Spain. Their union brought about the union, in the Trastámara dynasty , of the Crowns of Castile and Aragon.

The Kings, supported by the cities and the minor nobility, established a strong monarchy against the power lusts of the ecclesiastics and nobles. With the conquest of Granada , Navarre , the Canary Islands , Melilla and other African places, they achieved the territorial union under a single crown of all —except Ceuta and Olivenza , which then belonged to Portugal— of the territories that today make up Spain .

The Kings established a common foreign policy marked by the diplomatic character of Ferdinand the Catholic, which would lead to Hispanic hegemony in Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries. The discovery of America in 1492 was a milestone in world history.

This circumstance opened up enormous possibilities for the economy and science and accentuated the Atlantic expansion that would continue in the following centuries.

It is a historical literary subgenre that developed between the Pre-Renaissance of the  15th century and the Renaissance of the first half of the  16th century. It is included within the epic or narrative archgenre and is composed in prose with interspersed verses, sometimes in epistolary form ; it has a love theme, frequently within the laws of so-called courtly love . In this current, the following stand out:

• Diego de San Pedro . Some of his interesting poems are preserved in the Cancionero General of Hernando del Castillo ("Sermón", "Desprecio de fortuna"), but he is best known for his two sentimental novels , the Tratado de amores de Arnalte y Lucenda (1491) and Cárcel de amor (1492), in which courtly love is involved.
• Juan de Flores . He is the author of Breve tractado de Grimalte y Gradissa (Lérida, c. 1485), a sentimental novel that is actually a continuation of Boccaccio's Fiammetta , as stated in the title of the work.

Those that deal with the exploits of knights-errant, pleasant and artificial fictions of much entertainment and little benefit, such as the books of Amadís, of Don Galaor, of the Knight of Phoebus and of the others. This is how Sebastián de Cobarruvias defines the books of chivalry in his Treasury of the Castilian or Spanish language (1611) . ^[142 ]

Robert B. Tate states that

(...) there are various factors that distinguish the historiography of this period from that of preceding reigns. Firstly, the Crown showed signs of a growing interest in history, both in Romance and Latin (...). Secondly, historians were appointed who were not, as was customary, royal secretaries, but persons qualified by having received academic training, preferably abroad. (...) Thirdly, these historians were charged with both the preparation of works, mainly in Latin, and the translation of vernacular chronicles into this language. All this points to a change of approach that can be linked to the practice in other European countries. (...) It seems clear that the Catholic Monarchs, particularly Ferdinand, (...) wished to publish the history of their country abroad. They hoped in this way to dispel the legend of a barbarian Spain and to increase their own reputation as enlightened and cultured monarchs.

Robert B. Tate, Essays on Peninsular Historiography in the Fifteenth Century , Madrid, Gredos, 1970, p. 209. ISBN 84-7481-784-6 .

The main authors of this genre during the reign of Elizabeth I are:

• Hernando del Pulgar . Among his works are Letters , Book of the illustrious men of Castile and Chronicle of the very high and illustrious Catholic Monarchs Don Fernando and Doña Isabel . ^{[ 143} ]
• Antonio de Nebrija . This Spanish humanist was born in the ancient town of Nebrissa Veneria , today called Lebrija , in the province of Seville . The young Nebrija studied humanities in Salamanca and, when he was 19, he moved to Italy . His greatest work is Grammatica , the first work of study on the Spanish language.
• Incomplete Chronicle of the Catholic Monarchs . It is the most outstanding work of the period. The author of the work does not seem to be close to the monarchs. It is not finished and the name of the writer who composed it is unknown. It recounts war matters in detail, which suggests that the chronicler lived through them. ^{[ 144} ]

• The Isopete . This is how a series of fables by the Greek Aesop was known in the Middle Ages . They reached Europe through the version of Phaedrus , a translator from the 5th century  . Its full title is Esopete andstoriado , and it also includes fables by Avianus and Peter Alfonso . A biography of the fabulist is included as a prologue. Two of its most famous editions were made by Pablo Hurus in Zaragoza (1482, 1489). They contain more than one hundred engravings. ^{[ 145} ]
• Exemplario contra los engaños del mundo . Juan de Capua , a converted Jew, translated into Latin a Hebrew version of Calila and Dimna , which in Castilian was called Exemplario contra los engaños del mundo . The work has an original prologue, and also adds a genealogy of the origin of the text, although he does not know the Castilian version. ^{[ 146} ]

The Voyage of the Holy Land is the most important work of the period, which closes the stage dedicated to travel in medieval literature. It is the work of canon Bernard of Breidenbach . It is dedicated to the viceroy of Catalonia, Juan de Aragón. It was composed between 1485 and 1490 based on a trip undertaken in 1482. The work begins with the Treaty of Rome , composed by Martínez de Ampiés . It includes a historical summary of the city, its monuments and churches and its emperors, from Augustus to Constantine the Great . It was printed in Zaragoza by Pablo Hurus . ^[147 ]

The Nobiliario vero by Ferrán —or Ferrand, also called Fernán or Hernán— Mexía. It is a treatise on nobility and chivalry, whose inspiration comes from works such as Doctrinal de caballeros , by Alfonso de Cartagena, or the Tratado de las armas , by Diego de Valera . ^[148] ​[ ¹⁴⁹ ]

• ALVAR EZQUERRA : Carlos; MEGÍAS, José Manuel: Literature in the time of Sancho IV : Proceedings of the International Congress... , Alcalá de Henares , Publications Service of the University of Alcalá , 1996. ISBN 84-8138-980-3 .
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• ISBN 84-334-8405-2 .​​​​​
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• Books of Knowledge of Astronomy Archived 14 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine . , Catalogue of the Complutense University of Madrid . Images of the manuscript of 1276.