A journey through the versions of the story of Nalvillos from Ávila

Abstract

The Crónica de la población de Ávila contains, as one of its most prominent episodes, the story of Nalvillos and his wife. There is much done to establish the existing links between the narration, clearly a legendary one, and other versions included in other texts, unrelated to the chronicle and its characters (Livros de linhagens, the story of Salomon’s wife, Meriana’s romance). Nevertheless, there is not much analysis about the comparison between other existing versions of the same narration, attributed also to Nalvillos, included in other texts dedicated to Ávila: the Segunda leyenda de la muy noble, leal y antigua ciudad de Ávila and the Historia de las grandezas de Ávila by father Ariz. This work’s aim is to analyze the different ways in which the main aspects of the episode are handled, in order to perceive differences of nature between these texts.